A Calculator for Sediment Transport in Microchannels Based on the Rouse Number

TL;DR

This paper develops a modified Rouse number to estimate sediment transport modes in microchannels with laminar or weakly turbulent flows, validated through application to inkjet systems.

Contribution

It introduces a novel modification of the Rouse number for laminar and weakly turbulent flows in microchannels, enabling better sediment transport predictions.

Findings

The modified Rouse number aligns well with experimental data in inkjet systems.

It extends sediment transport modeling to laminar and microchannel flows.

The calculator can be applied to various microfluidic applications.

Abstract

The Rouse number is commonly used to estimate the mode of the sediment transports in turbulent flows with large Reynolds number. However, in microchannels such as in modern inkjet systems, the liquid flows are usually laminar. In this paper, I modify the Rouse number by expanding it to the case of weakly turbulent and laminar flows and construct a calculator to estimate the modes of sediment transport in microchannels. To illustrate the applicability of the modified Rouse number, I apply it to the transport of sediments in an inkjet system and compare theoretical results with experimental observations. The modified Rouse number constructed in this paper can be used in other application as well.