Abstract
This paper presents modeling and simulation of a wirelessly-controlled thermopneumatic zigzag micromixer. The micromixer is operated by selectively activating two passive wireless heaters with different resonant frequencies using an external magnetic field. Each heater is responsible for heating an air-heating chamber that is connected to a loading reservoir through a microdiffuser element, while the solutions pumped from each reservoir are mixed in a zigzag micromixing element that ends with an outlet hole. The performance of the micromixer is analyzed using finite element method, and mixing is investigated over a low range of Reynold’s number (Re) ⩽ 10 that is suitable various biomedical applications. The optimal activation switching time of the heaters is 10 s, at which the micromixer achieves a maximum mixing efficiency of ~96.1%, after ~65 s. The micromixer provides mixing-ratio controllability with a maximum flow rate and pressure drop of ~3.4 µL/min and ~385.22 Pa, respectively.
Keywords
- Finite element method
- Microfluidic
- Micromixer
- Thermopneumatic
- Wireless actuation
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Acknowledgments
This work was supported by Research University Grant (10H40 & 14H31) from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia; and Fundamental Research Grant Scheme (FRGS) & Prototype Development Research Grant Scheme (PRGS) from Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia. M. Nafea acknowledges the financial support from the Malaysian Technical Cooperation Programme (MTCP).
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Nafea, M., Ahmad, N., Wahap, A.R., Mohamed Ali, M.S. (2017). Modeling and Simulation of a Wireless Passive Thermopneumatic Micromixer. In: Mohamed Ali, M., Wahid, H., Mohd Subha, N., Sahlan, S., Md. Yunus, M., Wahap, A. (eds) Modeling, Design and Simulation of Systems. AsiaSim 2017. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 751. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-6463-0_27
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-6463-0_27
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