FLUID FLOW BIFURCATION IN MICRO-CHANNELS

摘要

The paper presents a numerical study of incompressible fluid flow through micro-channels. Using a high-resolution numerical method (second-order accurate) in conjunction with a non-linear multigrid algorithm and the pseudo-compressibility approach, we have investigated micro-flows through straight channels, as well as through a sudden contraction-expansion geometry. For the straight channel geometry, the computational results are in reasonable agreement with the experimental data for various low Reynolds numbers. For the contraction-expansion geometry, the results reveal the flow transition to instability. This is manifested in the form of asymmetric separation downstream of the expansion.