Optimal homogenization of perfusion flows in microfluidic bio-reactors; a numerical study

TL;DR

This study presents a numerical approach to designing microfluidic bio-reactors with uniform perfusion flows, utilizing topology and shape optimization to achieve homogeneous conditions for cell culture and analysis.

Contribution

It introduces a novel design methodology for microfluidic bio-reactors using topology and shape optimization, validated through comparison with analytic models.

Findings

Optimized inlet geometries produce uniform perfusion flows.

Parametric descriptions facilitate broad microfluidic bio-reactor design.

Numerical results confirm the effectiveness of the optimized designs.

Abstract

To ensure homogeneous conditions within the complete area of perfused microfluidic bio-reactors, we develop a general design of a continuously feed bio-reactor with uniform perfusion flow. This is achieved by introducing a specific type of perfusion inlet to the reaction area. The geometry of these inlets are found using the methods of topology optimization and shape optimization. The results are compared with two different analytic models, from which a general parametric description of the design is obtained and tested numerically. Such a parametric description will generally be beneficial for the design of a broad range of microfluidic bioreactors used for e.g. cell culturing and analysis, and in feeding bio-arrays.