Electrokinetic droplet transport from electroosmosis to electrophoresis.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 30444235.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1039/c8sm01788c and PMC identifier 6289104.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Droplet transport in microfluidic channels by electrically induced flows often entails the simultaneous presence of electroosmosis and electrophoresis. Here we make use of coupled lattice-Boltzmann/molecular dynamics simulations to compute the mobility of a droplet in a microchannel under the effect of an external electric field. By varying the droplet solvation free energy of the counterions released at the channel walls, we observe the continuous transition between the electroosmotic and electrophoretic regime. We show that it is possible to describe the mobility of a droplet in a unified, consistent way, by combining the theoretical description of the electroosmotic flow with, in this case, the Hückel limit of electrophoresis, modified in order to take into account the Hadamard-Rybczynski droplet drag.