Encyclopedia of Microfluidics and Nanofluidics

2015 Edition
| Editors: Dongqing Li

Fundamentals of Diffusion in Microfluidic Systems

  • Pramod Chamarthy
  • Aloke Kumar
  • Jinhua Cao
  • Steven T. Wereley
Reference work entry
First Online:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5491-5_608
How to cite

Synonyms

Self-diffusion

Definition

Brownian motion is defined as the irregular motion of microscopic particles suspended in a fluid due to collisions with the surrounding fluid molecules. The mean square displacement of a particle executing Brownian motion is directly proportional to the temperature of the fluid and inversely proportional to the viscosity of the fluid and the diameter of the particle.

Chemical and Physical Principles

In the latter half of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, Brownian motion played an important role in the debate about the molecular reality of nature. The random movement of microscopic particles suspended in a liquid is named after the botanist Robert Brown, who discovered this phenomenon while observing pollen grain suspended in water. Though Brown himself states that this motion was observed by other researchers before him such as Leeuwenhoek (1632–1723), Buffon (1800s), Spallanzani (1800s), and Bywater (1819), he is...

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media New York 2015

Authors and Affiliations

  • Pramod Chamarthy
    • 1
  • Aloke Kumar
    • 2
  • Jinhua Cao
    • 1
  • Steven T. Wereley
    • 3
  1. 1.Department of Mechanical EngineeringPurdue UniversityWest LafayetteUSA
  2. 2.Biosciences DivisionOak Ridge National LaboratoryOak RidgeUSA
  3. 3.Department of Mechanical EngineeringPurdue University, Birck Nanotechnology CenterWest LafayetteUSA