Search for: All records

Most studies on electrowetting (EW) involve the use of AC electric fields, which cause droplets to oscillate in response to the sinusoidal waveform. Oscillation-driven mixing in droplets is the basis for multiple microfluidic applications. Presently, we study the voltage and AC frequency-dependent oscillations of electrowetted water droplets on a smooth, hydrophobic surface. We introduce a new approach towards analyzing droplet oscillations, which involves characterization of the oscillation amplitude of the contact angle (CA). An experimentally validated, fundamentals-based model to predict voltage and frequency-dependent CA oscillations is developed, which is analogous to the Lippmann’s equation for predicting voltage-dependent CAs. It is seen that this approach can help estimate the threshold voltage more accurately, than from experimental measurements of CA change. Additionally, we use a coplanar electrode configuration with high voltage and ground electrodes arranged on the substrate. This configuration eliminates measurement artefacts in the classical EW configuration associated with a wire electrode protruding into the droplet. An interesting consequence of this configuration is that the system capacitance is reduced substantially, compared to the classical configuration. The coplanar electrode configuration shows a reduced rate of CA change with voltage, thereby increasing the voltage range over which the CA can be modulated.

Dropwise condensation heat transfer is significantly higher than filmwise condensation heat transfer due to the absence of the thermal resistance associated with the condensed water film. This study uses electrowetting to enhance coalescence and roll-off of condensed droplets, with the objective of enhancing the condensation rate. Coalescence enhancement is achieved by electric field-driven droplet motion such as translation of droplets, and oscillations of the three-phase line. Experiments are conducted to study early-stage droplet growth dynamics, and steady state condensation under electrowetting fields. Results show that droplet growth and roll-off increases with the voltage and frequency of the applied AC field. AC electric fields are seen to be more effective than DC electric fields. The overall condensation rate depends on the roll-off size of droplets, frequency of roll-off events, and on the interactions of the rolled-off droplets with the remainder of the droplets. All these phenomena can be altered by the applied electric field. An analytical heat transfer model is developed which uses the measured droplet size distribution to estimate the surface heat flux. Overall, this study reports that electric fields can enhance the condensation rate by more than 30 %.

This study addresses the combination of customized surface modification with the use of nanofluids, to infer on its potential to enhance pool-boiling heat transfer. Hydrophilic surfaces patterned with superhydrophobic regions were developed and used as surface interfaces with different nanofluids (water with gold, silver, aluminum and alumina nanoparticles), in order to evaluate the effect of the nature and concentration of the nanoparticles in bubble dynamics and consequently in heat transfer processes. The main qualitative and quantitative analysis was based on extensive post-processing of synchronized high-speed and thermographic images. To study the nucleation of a single bubble in pool boiling condition, a numerical model was also implemented. The results show an evident benefit of using biphilic patterns with well-established distances between the superhydrophobic regions. This can be observed in the resulting plot of the dissipated heat flux for a biphilic pattern with seven superhydrophobic spots, δ = 1/d and an imposed heat flux of 2132 w/m2. In this case, the dissipated heat flux is almost constant (except in the instant t* ≈ 0.9 when it reaches a peak of 2400 W/m2), whilst when using only a single superhydrophobic spot, where the heat flux dissipation reaches the maximum shortly after the detachmentmore »of the bubble, dropping continuously until a new necking phase starts. The biphilic patterns also allow a controlled bubble coalescence, which promotes fluid convection at the hydrophilic spacing between the superhydrophobic regions, which clearly contributes to cool down the surface. This effect is noticeable in the case of employing the Ag 1 wt% nanofluid, with an imposed heat flux of 2132 W/m2, where the coalescence of the drops promotes a surface cooling, identified by a temperature drop of 0.7 °C in the hydrophilic areas. Those areas have an average temperature of 101.8 °C, whilst the average temperature of the superhydrophobic spots at coalescence time is of 102.9 °C. For low concentrations as the ones used in this work, the effect of the nanofluids was observed to play a minor role. This can be observed on the slight discrepancy of the heat dissipation decay that occurred in the necking stage of the bubbles for nanofluids with the same kind of nanoparticles and different concentration. For the Au 0.1 wt% nanofluid, a heat dissipation decay of 350 W/m2 was reported, whilst for the Au 0.5 wt% nanofluid, the same decay was only of 280 W/m2. The results of the numerical model concerning velocity fields indicated a sudden acceleration at the bubble detachment, as can be qualitatively analyzed in the thermographic images obtained in this work. Additionally, the temperature fields of the analyzed region present the same tendency as the experimental results.« less