Microsystem Technologies (2019) 25:2751–2758

https://doi.org/10.1007/s00542-019-04296-4(0123456789().,-volV)(0123456789().
,- volV)

TECHNICAL PAPER

A novel Koch fractal micromixer with rounding corners structure

Xueye Chen1 • Shuai Zhang1 • Zhongli Wu1 • Yue Zheng1

Received: 3 August 2018 / Accepted: 4 January 2019 / Published online: 12 January 2019
Ó Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2019

Abstract
We study mainly the rounding structure of the micromixers based on Koch fractal. The mixing efficiencies of primary
fractal micromixer (PFM) and secondary fractal micromixer (SFM) are compared. SFM shows better mixing performance.
The mixing efficiency exceeds 90% at four different Reynolds number (Res). After rounding the corners of the secondary
fractal micromixer (RCSM), the mixing efficiency of the micromixer decreases slightly. But it is still better than PFM, and
the pressure-drop of the RCSM is significantly reduced compared to SFM. Especially at Reynolds (Re) = 100, the
pressure-drop is changed from 21295 Pa for the SFM to 12789 Pa for the RCSM. The effect of RCSM on reducing
pressure-drop is obvious. The analysis of the velocity fields of the RCSM is conducted to investigate the factors that may
effect the pressure-drop with the rounding corners, and the vortexes occupy a larger range of the sections A–A0 and B–B0
than SFM. The pressure-drop caused by rounding corners will be of great significance in bioengineering.

1 Introduction and increase the effective contact area between two

Micromixers are used to achieve full mixing of different
reactants under micro-scale conditions (Xia et al. 2005),
and are increasingly used in biochips (Lee et al. 2005; Ko
et al. 2011) and microchemical systems (Koch et al. 1999;
Hessel et al. 2005). Depending on whether external energy
is needed to promote mixing, micromixers are generally
divided into two main categories: active mixers (Zhou et al.
2014) and passive mixers (Ta et al. 2015). Active mixing
requires external forces to promote mixing, such as mag-
netic field (Yang et al. 2016), electric field (Zhou et al.
2016) and vibration (Liu et al. 2018). Active micromixers
depend on turbulence (Gambhire et al. 2016) or chaotic
convection (Xie and Xu 2017) to improve mixing effi-
ciency, with advantages of short mixing time (Yoshida
2015) and good controllability (Zhou et al. 2015). Due to
the need of external force to provide mixed power, the
equipment is more complex and expensive (Cortelezzi
et al. 2017), which is disadvantageous to the wide appli-
cation of micromixer in Lab-on-a-chip. Passive
micromixers usually use a microchannel with the complex
geometry to form chaotic convection (Chen et al. 2015),
microfluids (Ghadge and Misal 2014) to enhance their
molecular diffusion (Hossain and Kim 2014). Thus, the
mixing efficiency of fluids is improved. As the structure of
the micromixer becomes more complicated, reducing the
pressure-drop of the micromixer is a factor that cannot be
ignored (Gidde et al. 2018). Excessive pressure has a great
influence on cell activity in biomedical applications (Lin
2015), and it is also very easy to cause leakage (Jain and
Unni 2016). Several micro-structured plates with various
mixing structures were selected by Holvey et al. (2011) to
characterize their pressure drop and mixing efficiency. The
study of Gidde et al. (2018) have shown that the micro-
mixer with circular chambers resulted in a lower pressure-
drop than the micromixer with square chambers. In our
study work, the results also show that the multi-wave
micromixer has lower pressure-drop than the square-wave
micromixer and the zigzag micromixer (Chen et al. 2016).
Based on these studies, we round the corners of the Koch
fractal micromixer based on our previous study (Chen and
Zhang 2018) in order to obtain a micromixer with the better
performance.

& Xueye Chen

xueye_chen@126.com
1
Faculty of Mechanical Engineer and Automation, Liaoning
University of Technology, Jinzhou 121001, China

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2752 Microsystem Technologies (2019) 25:2751–2758

three miecromixers. The total length of the microchannel is

15 mm, the length of the inlets is 4.3 mm, and the outlet is
4.2 mm. The width and height of the microchannel are
0.2 mm and 0.3 mm, respectively. The mixing area con-
sists of two Koch fractal units of length 5.4 mm. Radius of
the RCSM is R = 0.2 mm and r = 0.1 mm. Those
micromixers with two inlets and one outlet are designed
using the Solidworks software.

2.2 Governing equations

The following Navier–Stokes (N–S) equations are used for

the fluid dynamic analysis:
ou
q þ qðu  rÞu þ rp  gr2 u ¼ 0 ð1Þ
ot
Fig. 1 Koch fractal principle ru¼0 ð2Þ

2 Theoretical background where u is the velocity vector, q is the fluid density, g is

the dynamic viscosity and p is the pressure. Equation (1) is
2.1 Koch fractal principle the equation of momentum balance. Equation (2) is the
equation of continuity for incompressible fluids.
Figure 1 shows the design process of the microchannel The following convective diffusion equation is used for
based on the Koch fractal principle. ‘‘L = 5.4 mm’’ is a concentration analysis:
straight line. The length of the primary fractal ‘‘E = L/ oc
þ r  ðDrcÞ ¼ u  rc ð3Þ
3 = 1.8 mm’’, the angle between the two sides is 60°. ot
Based on the primary fractal, the length of secondary
where c is the concentration, D is diffusion coefficient and
fractal ‘‘F = E/3 = 0.6 mm’’. Figure 2 shows the size of
u is the velocity vector.

Fig. 2 The structures of three

Koch fractal micromixers

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Microsystem Technologies (2019) 25:2751–2758 2753

The Re of square microchannel is calculated as follows:

100
PFM
2AB SFM
Dd ¼ ð4Þ
AþB ROSM

VDd

Mixing efficiency (%)

Re ¼ ð5Þ
m 95

where Re is the Reynolds number, Dd is the Equivalent

diameter, A is the height, B is the width, V is the velocity
and m is the Kinematic viscosity.
90
Mixing efficiency of the sample can be calculated by the
formula as follow.
vffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
u N 
u 1 X ci  c  2
M ¼1t ð6Þ 85
N i¼1 c
0.1 1 10 100
Re
where M is the mixing efficiency, N is the total number of
sampling points, ci and c are normalized concentration and Fig. 3 The mixing efficiency of three micromixers
expected normalized concentration, respectively. Mixing
efficiency ranges from 0 (0%, not mixing) to 1 (100%, full mixing efficiency of the RCSM is closer to the SFM, and
mixed). its mixing efficiency also exceeds 90%, especially at
Re = 100, it is almost completely mixed. In contrast, the
2.3 Finite element modeling PFM has a relatively poor mixing efficiency at four Res.
From the comparative analysis of the mixing efficiency of
The COMSOL Multiphysics software is a numerical sim- the micromixers, it can be concluded that the fractal
ulation software which is based on the finite element structure can significantly improve the mixing efficiency.
method. It can solve some partial differential equations Comprehensive consideration of various factors that
about the physics simulation. In this paper, three may affect the performance of the micromixer, the impact
micromixers which are designed by the SolidWorks soft- of pressure can not be ignored. Table 1 shows the pressure-
ware, respectively import into the model builder window of drop of the three structures. Affected by the secondary
the COMSOL Multiphysics software. fractal structure, pressure-drop is significantly greater than
primary fractal structure and rounding corners structure.
1. The dimension is set to be three dimensions, the
Especially at Re = 100, this trend is more pronounced, the
samples are the blue ink and red ink with different
pressure-drop is 12938 Pa, 21295 Pa and 12789 Pa. At low
concentration.
Res, the changing in pressure-drop is not particularly
2. The sample concentration of the micromixer with two
noticeable, this may be related to the low velocity and low
inlets are, respectively set the blue ink C1 = 0 mol/L
inlet-pressure at low Res. More noteworthy is that the
and red ink C2 = 1 mol/L.
pressure-drop of the rounding corners structure of the
3. The diffusion coefficient of the ink is 1 9 10-10 m2/s.
complex secondary fractal is less than the simple primary
The fluid dynamic boundary conditions are no-slip at
fractal structure. This is very important for microfluidic
all walls. The pressure is 0 Pa at the outlet of the
chip applications in cell culture, Lower pressure-drop
microchannels.
contributes to increase cell activity. It is an effective
4. The maximum size of the grid is 0.0215 mm, the
method to reduce the pressure-drop of complex
minimum size is 0.0027 mm, and the number of grids
microchannel structure through rounding corners.
is 1,569,031.
Based on the above analysis, it can be determined that
secondary fractal structure increases the mixing efficiency,

3 Results and discussion

Table 1 The pressure-drop of the three structures

Mixing efficiency is the most important performance of a Structure Re 0.1 1 10 100

micromixer. Figure 3 shows the mixing efficiency of three PFM Pressure drop (Pa) 8.01 80.1 826.7 12,938
different types of micromixers. It can be clearly seen from SFM 8.25 83.34 904.4 21,295
the Fig. 3 that the SFM has a better mixing efficiency than ROSM 7.76 77.7 814.4 12,789
the other two structures at four Res. On the other hand, the

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2754
and the rounding corners structure can effectively reduce
the pressure-drop. In Figs. 4 and 5, blue and red indicate
the concentration of the two fluids as 0 mol/L and 1 mol/L,
respectively, and the legend indicates that the concentra-
tion of the fluids changes from 0–1 mol/L. Figure 4 com-
pares the simulation concentrations of two structures at
four Res 0.1, 1, 10 and 100. The simulation concentrations
of the two structures are similar at four Res. The biggest
difference is that the contact surfaces of the two fluids are
relatively smooth after rounding corners. This may be the
reason for the lower pressure-drop after rounding corners.
In Fig. 5, it shows the streamlines of two fluids in mixed
area of the micromixers, the streamlines indicate the flow
path of the fluids. The rounding corners make the stream-
lines smoother than the secondary fractal structure, which
helps reducing energy loss during fluids flowing and
decreases the resistance of the microchannels. As a result,
it effectively reduces the pressure-drop of the micromixer.
The smoothness of the flow path of the streamlines also
explains the reason why the contact surface of the two
fluids are smoother.
In the view of above analysis, the better mixing effi-
ciency exhibited by the micromixer at low Re and high Re
attracts our attention. In Figs. 6, 7, 8 and 9, they show the
mixing concentration of the micromixers at Re = 0.1 and
Re = 100 of secondary fractal structure and rounding
Fig. 4 The simulation concentrations of two structures at four Res 0.1, 1, 10 and 100 (color figure online)
123
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Microsystem Technologies (2019) 25:2751–2758
corners structure, and the color of arrows in the sections A–
A0 and B–B0 which are the representative position denotes
the velocity field. In Figs. 6 and 8, molecular diffusion
dominates the mixing of micromixers at low Re = 0.1.
Mixing efficiency is related to the total path of the
microchannel, it determines the residence time of the fluids
in the micromixer. In sections A–A0 and B–B0 of Figs. 6
and 8, the changing of velocity field is disorder, they don’t
have much difference. This shows that rounding corners
has little effect on the micromixer at low Re, and it cor-
responds to the inconspicuous changing in pressure-drop
shown in the Table 1.
In Figs. 7 and 9, strong chaotic convection occurs in
sections A–A0 and B–B0 at high Re = 100, they are
essential to improve the mixing efficiency of the
micromixers. In Fig. 7, the chaos convection phenomenon
in sections A–A0 and B–B0 is relatively weaker than Fig. 9,
it occupies a fraction of the sections. In contrast, there are
obvious vortex in sections A–A0 and B–B0 of Fig. 9, and
the vortexes occupy a larger range of the sections, they can
significantly enhance the chaotic convection of the
micromixer. As the rounding corners, the chaotic convec-
tion is significantly enhanced. But, the mixing efficiency of
the RCSM is slightly lower than the SFM which has shown
in Fig. 3, it may be because of the smaller resistance of
microchannels, and the relatively short time the fluids stay
Microsystem Technologies (2019) 25:2751–2758 2755

Fig. 5 The velocity streamlines of two fluids in mixed area at four Res 0.1, 1, 10 and 100 (color figure online)

Fig. 6 Velocity field in the

sections A–A0 and B–B0 of
secondary fractal structure at
Re = 0.1

in microchannel. Its greatest advantage is that it effectively
reduces the pressure-drop of the micromixer which has
shown in Table 1.
In Fig. 10, it shows the mixing experiment of the sec-
ondary Koch fractal mixture with the rounding corners.
When two different colors of yellow and blue fluids flow
into the microchannel from the two inlets, the mixed green
liquid could be present at the outlet. As can be seen from
the magnified view of the micromixer, the fluid quickly
appears green after entering the microchannel. It can be
determined that rounding corners structure can also achieve
rapid mixing of fluids.

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2756 Microsystem Technologies (2019) 25:2751–2758

Fig. 7 Velocity field in the

sections A–A0 and B–B0 of
secondary fractal structure at
Re = 100

Fig. 8 Velocity field in the

sections A–A0 and B–B0 with
rounding corners structure at
Re = 0.1

Fig. 9 Velocity field in the

sections A–A0 and B–B0 with
rounding corners structure at
Re = 100

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Microsystem Technologies (2019) 25:2751–2758
Fig. 10 Mixing experiment of the secondary Koch fractal mixture with the rounding corners
4 Conclusions
In this paper, we study mainly the effect of rounding cor-
ners on the mixing performance of Koch fractal micro-
mixer. The mixing performance of the SFM is significantly
better than that of the primary fractal, and its mixing effi-
ciency exceeds 90% at four different Reynolds number.
After rounding corners, the mixing efficiency drops
slightly, but the changing of the pressure-drop is even more
pronounced. Especially at Re = 100, the pressure-drop
changes from 21295 to 12789 Pa. It is of great significance
to reduce the damage to cell activity in the application of
cell microfluidic chips. In the mixing area of the
micromixers, the better smoothness of the contact surfaces
and velocity of the two fluids are the main factors to cause
the reducing of the pressure-drop. As the rounding corners
reduces the resistance of microchannel, strong chaotic
convection occurs in sections A–A0 and B–B0 at high
Re = 100. Based on these studies, it can be concluded that
with the increasing of Re, the pressure-drop of the RCSM
has a significant downward trend, and the mixing perfor-
mance is not affected too much.
Acknowledgements This work was supported by The Key Project of
Department of Education of Liaoning Province (JZL201715401),
Liaoning BaiQianWan Talents Program (2017), Scholarship of China
National Scholarship Council (201808210025). We sincerely thank
Prof. Chong Liu for his kind guidance.
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