Diodicity mechanism Tesla-type microvalves: a CFD study

Microvalve is one of the most important components in microfluidic systems and micropumps. In this paper, three-dimensional incompressible flow through a Tesla-type microvalve is simulated using FLUENT computational fluid dynamic package. The flow is laminar and SIMPLE algorithm is used. The second-order upwind method is implemented for discretizing convective terms. The diodicity mechanism is investigated in detail for three different microvalves. Effect of several series Tesla-type microvalves on diodicity is also studied. The numerical analyses reveal that the mechanism of diodicity occurs at the T-junction and side channel. If inlet and outlet channels are eliminated, diodicity can be increased by 2. Pressure field analysis shows that the pressure drop is much severe at the junction of the reverse flow compared to the forward flow. The obtained numerical results are compared with those of experimental and a good agreement between them is noticed.