Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Nomenclature
- Introduction
- 1 Kinematics, Conservation Equations, and Boundary Conditions for Incompressible Flow
- 2 Unidirectional Flow
- 3 Hydraulic Circuit Analysis
- 4 Passive Scalar Transport: Dispersion, Patterning, and Mixing
- 5 Electrostatics and Electrodynamics
- 6 Electroosmosis
- 7 Potential Fluid Flow
- 8 Stokes Flow
- 9 The Diffuse Structure of the Electrical Double Layer
- 10 Zeta Potential in Microchannels
- 11 Species and Charge Transport
- 12 Microchip Chemical Separations
- 13 Particle Electrophoresis
- 14 DNA Transport and Analysis
- 15 Nanofluidics: Fluid and Current Flow in Molecular-Scale and Thick-EDL Systems
- 16 AC Electrokinetics and the Dynamics of Diffuse Charge
- 17 Particle and Droplet Actuation: Dielectrophoresis, Magnetophoresis, and Digital Microfluidics
- APPENDIX A Units and Fundamental Constants
- APPENDIX B Properties of Electrolyte Solutions
- APPENDIX C Coordinate Systems and Vector Calculus
- APPENDIX D Governing Equation Reference
- APPENDIX E Nondimensionalization and Characteristic Parameters
- APPENDIX F Multipolar Solutions to the Laplace and Stokes Equations
- APPENDIX G Complex Functions
- APPENDIX H Interaction Potentials: Atomistic Modeling of Solvents and Solutes
- Bibliography
- Index
3 - Hydraulic Circuit Analysis
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Nomenclature
- Introduction
- 1 Kinematics, Conservation Equations, and Boundary Conditions for Incompressible Flow
- 2 Unidirectional Flow
- 3 Hydraulic Circuit Analysis
- 4 Passive Scalar Transport: Dispersion, Patterning, and Mixing
- 5 Electrostatics and Electrodynamics
- 6 Electroosmosis
- 7 Potential Fluid Flow
- 8 Stokes Flow
- 9 The Diffuse Structure of the Electrical Double Layer
- 10 Zeta Potential in Microchannels
- 11 Species and Charge Transport
- 12 Microchip Chemical Separations
- 13 Particle Electrophoresis
- 14 DNA Transport and Analysis
- 15 Nanofluidics: Fluid and Current Flow in Molecular-Scale and Thick-EDL Systems
- 16 AC Electrokinetics and the Dynamics of Diffuse Charge
- 17 Particle and Droplet Actuation: Dielectrophoresis, Magnetophoresis, and Digital Microfluidics
- APPENDIX A Units and Fundamental Constants
- APPENDIX B Properties of Electrolyte Solutions
- APPENDIX C Coordinate Systems and Vector Calculus
- APPENDIX D Governing Equation Reference
- APPENDIX E Nondimensionalization and Characteristic Parameters
- APPENDIX F Multipolar Solutions to the Laplace and Stokes Equations
- APPENDIX G Complex Functions
- APPENDIX H Interaction Potentials: Atomistic Modeling of Solvents and Solutes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The previous chapters introduce the governing equations for fluid flow and provide solutions for simple unidirectional flows. Although we can only rarely use these simple solutions to exactly describe real flows, these unidirectional flows provide a framework for generating engineering estimates for many flows, and these estimation techniques reduce complex systems with large numbers of components into a relatively simple, approximate, linear description. This is relevant for flow in microdevices both (1) because microdevices can straightforwardly be made with large numbers of microchannels and (2) because those microchannels often have long, thin geometries that lead to largely unidirectional flows that are well approximated by the solutions presented in Chapter 2. Our approach, called hydraulic circuit analysis, involves assuming that the Poiseuille flow derived in Chapter 2 provides a sound engineering estimate of the pressure drops and flow rates through long, straight channels, even if the cross section is not exactly circular and the channels are neither perfectly straight nor infinite in extent. We thus write an approximate linear relation between pressure drops and flow rates through these channels – the Hagen – Poiseuille law. This law, combined with conservation of mass, approximately prescribes fluid flow through complex rigid networks by solution of sets of algebraic equations. By adding a hydraulic capacitance or compliance, this linearized analysis also allows prediction of unsteady flow through channels with a finite flexibility.
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- Information
- Micro- and Nanoscale Fluid MechanicsTransport in Microfluidic Devices, pp. 60 - 78Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010
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