A Three-Dimentional Micro Flow Generated by an Optical Rotator

Abstract

Microfluidic systems will be widely used in the future μ-TAS and DNA analyses. Due to the small Reynolds number in a microchannel, mixing is performed by increasing the contact area between two liquid. Here, we propose an active method to stir a liquid using an optically-driven micro-rotator. In this report, we have analyzed the micro-liquid velocity vectors around the rotators at different depths for both horizontal and vertical rotations.