Efficient gas–liquid contact using microfluidic membrane devices with staggered herringbone mixers

Author(s): Tim Femmer ¹ ^, ² ^, ³ ^, ⁴ ^, ⁵ , Max L. Eggersdorfer ⁶ ^, ⁷ ^, ⁸ ^, ⁹ , Alexander J. C. Kuehne ⁵ ^, ² ^, ¹⁰ ^, ⁴ , Matthias Wessling ¹ ^, ² ^, ³ ^, ⁴ ^, ⁵

Publication date (Electronic): 2015

Journal: Lab on a Chip

Publisher: Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)

Read this article at

ScienceOpenPublisher PubMed

Bookmark

There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

Abstract

A microfluidic membrane device with staggered herringbone mixers for improved mass transport and reduced pressure drop.

Abstract

We describe a novel membrane based gas–liquid-contacting device with increased mass transport and reduced pressure loss by combining a membrane with a staggered herringbone static mixer. Herringbone structures are imposed on the microfluidic channel geometry via soft lithography, acting as mixers which introduce secondary flows at the membrane interface. Such flows include Dean vortices and Taylor flows generating effective mixing while improving mass transport and preventing concentration polarization in microfluidic channels. Furthermore, our static herringbone mixer membranes effectively reduce pressure losses leading to devices with enhanced transfer properties for microfluidic gas–liquid contact. We investigate the red blood cell distribution to tailor our devices towards miniaturised extracorporeal membrane oxygenation and improved comfort of patients with lung insufficiencies.

Related collections

Most cited references 22

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Chaotic mixer for microchannels.

Abraham Stroock, Stephan K W Dertinger, Armand Ajdari … (2002)

It is difficult to mix solutions in microchannels. Under typical operating conditions, flows in these channels are laminar-the spontaneous fluctuations of velocity that tend to homogenize fluids in turbulent flows are absent, and molecular diffusion across the channels is slow. We present a passive method for mixing streams of steady pressure-driven flows in microchannels at low Reynolds number. Using this method, the length of the channel required for mixing grows only logarithmically with the Péclet number, and hydrodynamic dispersion along the channel is reduced relative to that in a simple, smooth channel. This method uses bas-relief structures on the floor of the channel that are easily fabricated with commonly used methods of planar lithography.