Mixing Performance of an Electroosmotic Micromixer: Effect of Baffle

In recent years, electrokinetic effects, viz., electroosmotic flow and electrophoretic phenomenon finds applications in the field of micromixing. To address such an application, we present a novel approach to micromixing. In our present study, simulation has been performed for Mixing Quality (MQ) of two different concentration fluids in one ring-shaped micromixer using electroosmotic flow. The micromixer consists of two pairs of electrodes at the outer surface of the micromixer at specific locations, also two baffles are considered at prescribed distances from the inlets of the micromixer. The two electrode pairs are excited by an alternating current (AC) and can generate micro-vortices near the electrodes even for a highly ordered laminar flow, as a result of efficient mixing. In the present study, two baffles are also considered to enhance the mixing quality. Comsol Multiphysics solver has been employed to carry out the simulations. We have considered Navier–Stokes equation to know the flow field and the convection–diffusion equation to know the concentration field. The proposed model can achieve 95.61% mixing quality at the inlet velocity of 0.05 mm/s. A comparison study has also been performed between one ring-shaped micromixer with and without baffles.