Mixing and Residence Time Distribution Studies in Microchannels with Floor Herringbone Structures

A. Cantu-Perez, S. Ping Kee, and A. Gavriilidis
University College London, Department of Chemical Engineering, Torrington Place, London, UK
Published in 2008

The mixing characteristics and residence time distributions (RTDs) of a staggered herringbone microchannel have been investigated numerically by COMSOL Multiphysics and by particle tracking algorithms that incorporate diffusion via a random walk. All simulations were validated with experimental data.

It was found that for low Peclet numbers the use of herringbone structures have little impact on the RTD. However at higher Peclet numbers the herringbone channels have a narrower RTD than a rectangular channel.

This opens the possibility of increasing the dimensions of the channel or the flowrate without compromising its performance in terms of RTD.