Growth of clogs in parallel microchannels
Name
PhysRevFluids.3.104301.pdf
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2.54 MB
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Author(s)
Sauret, Alban
Somszor, Katarzyna
Villermaux, Emmanuel
Dressaire, Emilie
Date Issued
October 2018
Journal
Physical Review Fluids
Publisher
American Physical Society
Citation
Sauret, Alban, et al. “Growth of Clogs in Parallel Microchannels.” Physical Review Fluids, vol. 3, no. 10, Oct. 2018. © 2018 American Physical Society
Version
Final published version
Abstract
During the transport of colloidal suspensions in microchannels, the deposition of particles can lead to the formation of clogs, typically at constrictions. Once a clog is formed in a microchannel, advected particles form an aggregate upstream from the site of the blockage. This aggregate grows over time, which leads to a dramatic reduction of the flow rate. In this paper, we present a model that predicts the growth of the aggregate formed upon clogging of a microchannel. We develop an analytical description that captures the time evolution of the volume of the aggregate, as confirmed by experiments performed using a pressure-driven suspension flow in a microfluidic device. We show that the growth of the aggregate increases the hydraulic resistance in the channel and leads to a drop in the flow rate of the suspensions. We then derive a model for the growth of aggregates in multiple parallel microchannels where the clogging events are described using a stochastic approach. The aggregate growths in the different channels are coupled. Our work illustrates the critical influence of clogging events on the evolution of the flow rate in microchannels. The coupled dynamics of the aggregates described here for parallel channels is key to bridge clogging at the pore scale with macroscopic observations of the flow rate evolution at the filter scale.
MIT Department
MIT Energy Initiative
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevFluids.3.104301
