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Mathematical Model of Fluid Front Dynamics Driven by Porous Media Pumps

Authors:
A. Benavent-Claró, Y. Alvarez-Braña, F. Benito-Lopez, L. Basabe-Desmonts, A. Hernandez-Machado
Year:
2024
Journal:
Arxiv.org
DOI:
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2405.14666
Description:

Air-permeable porous media hosts air within their pores. Upon removal from the material’s interior, these porous media

have the tendency to replenish the air, effectively acting as a suction pump. Therefore, the technique used to convert

a porous media into a pump, consists of degassing the material to remove their air inside. The suction property when

recovering the air, can be used to move a liquid through a microfluidic channel, studying the dynamics of the liquid-air

front. In this article, we have developed a theoretical mathematical model that precisely characterize the behavior of

this kind of pumps and the dynamics of the liquid-air front. This model allows us to use porous media pumps as very

accurate devices to move liquids in a completely controlled way, being able to obtain characteristic properties of fluids

such as viscosity or the pressure applied to them. We have tested it using experimental data from the literature, and we

have been able to observe that the theory fits satisfactorily with the experiments, being able to affirm that the model is

correctly satisfied. This type of pump is of great interest to the scientific community because of its small size and the

fact that it operates without any external power source.

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