Resonant Mode-hopping Micromixing.

A common micromixer design strategy is to generate interleaved flow topologies to enhance diffusion. However, problems with these designs include complicated structures and dead volumes within the flow fields. We present an active micromixer using a resonating piezoceramic/silicon composite diaphragm to generate acoustic streaming flow topologies. Circulation patterns are observed experimentally and correlate to the resonant mode shapes of the diaphragm. The dead volumes in the flow field are eliminated by rapidly switching from one discrete resonant mode to another (i.e., resonant mode-hop). Mixer performance is characterized by mixing buffer with a fluorescence tracer containing fluorescein. Movies of the mixing process are analyzed by converting fluorescent images to two-dimensional fluorescein concentration distributions. The results demonstrate that mode-hopping operation rapidly homogenized chamber contents, circumventing diffusion-isolated zones.