Microfluidics and Nanofluidics

, 21:152 | Cite as

Mixing characteristics in microchannels with biomimetic superhydrophobic (Lotus leaf replica) walls

  • Saumyadwip Bandyopadhyay
  • Ranabir Dey
  • M. Kiran Raj
  • Nandini Bhandaru
  • Rabibrata Mukherjee
  • Suman Chakraborty
Research Paper
First Online:
Received:
Accepted:

Abstract

We demonstrate here the mixing characteristics in microchannels with a biomimetic superhydrophobic (lotus leaf replica) wall. The lotus leaf replica is fabricated using a frugal, yet efficient, double-step soft lithography method. In microchannels with a lotus leaf replica wall, the unidirectional laminar flow pertaining to the low hydrodynamics regime changes into an erratic flow field beyond a critical flow rate. We show here that such lotus leaf replica-induced erratic flow, even for low Reynolds number, can be used for enhanced mixing at the microscale. The enhancement in the mixing is quantified by the reduction in the mixing length in the microchannels with the biomimetic lotus leaf replica wall as compared to identical microchannels with flat walls. We believe that the simple cost-effective methodology for enhancing mixing in microchannels, as demonstrated here, can be integrated into lab-on-a-chip devices, which may be beneficial for applications requiring microscale mixing like DNA sequencing, enzyme reaction, and medical diagnostics.

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Copyright information

© Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany 2017

Authors and Affiliations

  • Saumyadwip Bandyopadhyay
    • 1
  • Ranabir Dey
    • 2
    • 4
  • M. Kiran Raj
    • 1
  • Nandini Bhandaru
    • 3
  • Rabibrata Mukherjee
    • 3
  • Suman Chakraborty
    • 1
    • 2
  1. 1.Advanced Technology Development CentreIndian Institute of Technology KharagpurKharagpurIndia
  2. 2.Department of Mechanical EngineeringIndian Institute of Technology KharagpurKharagpurIndia
  3. 3.Instability and Soft Patterning Laboratory, Department of Chemical EngineeringIndian Institute of Technology KharagpurKharagpurIndia
  4. 4.Physics of Complex FluidsMESA+ Institute for NanotechnologyEnschedeThe Netherlands

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