Effects of rectangular microchannel aspect ratio on laminar friction constant

In this paper, the effects of rectangular microchannel aspect ratio on laminar friction constant are described. The behavior of fluids was studied using surface micromachined rectangular metallic pipette arrays. Each array consisted of 5 or 7 pipettes with widths varying from 150 μm to 600 μm and heights ranging from 22.71 μm to 26.35 μm. A downstream port for static pressure measurement was used to eliminate entrance effects. A controllable syringe pump was used to provide flow while a differential pressure transducer was used to record the pressure drop. The experimental data obtained for water for flows at Reynolds numbers below 10 showed an approximate 20% increase in the friction constant for a specified driving potential when compared to macroscale predictions from the classical Navier-Stokes theory. When the experimental data are studied as a function of aspect ratio, a 20% increase in the friction constant is evident at low aspect ratios. A similar increase is shown by the currently available experimental data for low Reynolds number (<100) flows of water.