International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 55 (2012) 62856290

Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect

International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijhmt

Technical Note

Thermally fully developed electroosmotic ow through a rectangular microchannel

Jie Su a, Yongjun Jian a,, Long Chang a,b
a
b

School of Mathematical Science, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot, Inner Mongolia 010021, China
School of Mathematics and Statistics, Inner Mongolia Finance and Economics College, Hohhot, Inner Mongolia 010051, China

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 11 January 2012
Received in revised form 14 May 2012
Accepted 18 May 2012
Available online 23 June 2012
Keywords:
Rectangular microchannel
Electroosmotic ow
Fully developed
Joule heating

a b s t r a c t
This study investigates the velocity and temperature distributions of the thermally fully developed
electroosmotic ow through a rectangular microchannel. Based on linearized PoissonBoltzmann (PB)
equation, NavierStokes equation and thermally fully developed energy equation, analytical solutions
of normalized velocity, temperature and Nusselt number are derived. They greatly depend on the ratio
K of characteristic scale of the rectangular microchannel to Debye length, width to height ratio a and
Joule heating to heat ux ratio S. By numerical computation, we found that for prescribed electrokinetic
width K, increased S yields greater temperature. For small K, the variations of the temperature h are larger
than those of large K. The dependence of temperature on S is more signicant for a small K, while at a
larger K the temperature proles are almost identical. In addition, we illustrate the Nusselt number Nu
variations with S, a and K.
2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Microuidics is a very important research area due to numerous
potential applications in separation and analysis. Most substances
acquire surface electric charges when in contact with an aqueous
medium. The rearrangement of the charges on the solid surface
and in the liquid results in the formation of the electrical double
layer (EDL) [1]. If an electric eld is applied tangentially along a
charged surface, the electric eld will exert a body force on the ions
in the diffuse layer, resulting in electroosmotic ow (EOF).
Many experimental observations have shown that ow phenomena and heat transfer in microscale are quite different from
those in macroscale. Many hydrodynamics of a fully-developed
and transient EOF have been analyzed in various micro-capillaries
geometric domains [27]. Recently, Investigations have been conducted to better understand the heat transfer characteristics in
microchannel for applications in electronic cooling. The effect of
viscous dissipation in fully developed electroosmotic heat transfer
has been analyzed by Maynes and Webb [8]. Closed form expressions in a parallel plate or circular microchannel for Nusselt number were obtained for electroosmotic heat transfer with or without
Joule heating effects [911].
Understanding the heat transfer characteristics of EOF through
a rectangular microchannel is very important. However, there
appear to be no studies reported in the literature treating convective heat transfer for EOF through a rectangular microchannel. The

Corresponding author.
E-mail address: jianyongjun@yahoo.com.cn (Y. Jian).
0017-9310/$ - see front matter 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2012.05.056

purpose of this study is to present analytical expressions for thermally and hydrodynamically fully developed EOF in a rectangular
microchannel with constant wall heat ux.
2. Mathematical modeling
2.1. EDL potential distribution
A straight two dimensional rectangular microchannel of width
2W, height 2H and length L is shown in Fig. 1. The uid ow is
acted upon by an axial steady electric eld of strength E. Due to
the symmetry of the problem, the solution domain can be reduced
to a quarter cross section of the channel. For a symmetric binary
electrolyte solution, the electrical potential w of the EDL is
described by the PB equation



@ 2 w @ 2 w 2n0 zm e
zm ew

sinh
@x2 @y2
kb T 0
e

which is subject to the following boundary conditions

wjxW f;

wjyH f;


dw
0;
dx x0


dw
0
dy y0

where e is the dielectric constant of the electrolyte liquid, n0 is the

ion density of bulk liquid, zm is the valence, e is the electron charge,
kb is the Boltzmann constant, T0 is the absolute temperature and f is
the wall zeta potential. We assume the electrical potential is small
enough, so that the DebyeHckel linearization approximation can
be used. Introducing the following dimensionless groups:

6286

J. Su et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 55 (2012) 62856290

2.2. The analytical solutions of the Cauchy momentum equation

We consider the only axial velocity component u(x, y) along
positive z direction in the rectangular microchannel. For a hydrodynamic fully developed pure EOF, the Cauchy momentum equation can be simplied to

!
@2u @2u
qe E

@x2 @y2

where qe is the net volume charge density, and l is the uid viscosity. Eq. (9) is subjected to the following no-slip and symmetric
boundary conditions

Fig. 1. Sketch of thermally and hydrodynamically fully developed EOF through a

rectangular microchannel.

uW; y 0;

ux; H 0

10a

@u0; y
0;
@x

@ux; 0
0
@y

10b

Using the following dimensionless steady EOF velocity

x
y
 zv ew ;
 ; w
; y
H
H
kb T 0

1=2
2n0 z2m e2
j
; K jH
ekb T 0

x

f zv ef ;
kb T 0

U
3

Where j is DebyeHckel parameter, K is called the electrokinetic

width. Thus the normalized Eq. (1) and boundary conditions Eq.
(2) can now be expressed as
2

2

@ w @ w

2 K2w

@ x2 @ y
 y

@ w0;
0;
@ x
 a; y
 f;
w

 x; 0
@ w
0

@y

5a
5b

where a = W/H is the ratio of the width to height of the channel section, f is the dimensionless wall zeta potential. The solution to the
linearized PB Eq. (4) subjected to the boundary conditions Eq. (5)
can be obtained as [12]

 4f
w

q 
K 2 b2m x

2m  1p
;
2

Em

cn

2n  1p
;
2a

@2U @2U

2 K 2 w

@ x2 @ y
 0;
Ua; y

1n1

m; n 1; 2; 3; . . .

kb T 0
w
zv e

qe ej


@U0; y
0;
@ x

@Ux; 0
0

@y

13

Similar to our recent work [13], the solution of Eq. (12) can be
written as
1
X


Ux; y

cos

p 

kj x Y j y

14

j1

)
p ( 1
1
 X Q nj J nj X
A cosh
kj y
P mj Imj

p
Y j y p

Fn
Em
kj
kj cosh
n1


qm1

8
p
>

  cosh
>
K 2 c2n y
kj y
1 Q nj cosh
<X
A
>
F n K 2 c2n  kj
>
: n1

8
A  K 2f;

kj

p h
kj

Imj

J nj
;

7b

The detail derivation can be found in Ref. [13]. The ionic net charge
density gives
2

12

Ux; 1 0;

q 
K 2 b2m a

1m1
q
2n  1p cosh
K 2 c2n

Fn

11

The normalized form of Eqs. (9) and (10) are

kj

7a
2m  1p cosh

ekb ET 0
lzv e


)
p
1
X

  cosbm y
P mj cosh
kj y

Em kj b2m
m1


cosbm y
Em
m1
q 

K 2 c2n y
1 cosh
X
coscn x
4f
Fn
n1

where bm

U eo 

where

 x; 1 f
w

1 cosh
X

u
;
U eo

Once the distributions of charge density are known, the Cauchy

momentum can be solved analytically.

b2m

cosh

p
kj

K 2 c2n  kj

2
j  1=2p

j 1; 2; 3; . . .

p
i
kj  cosbm

cosh

q
p
K 2 c2n  cosh
kj

8
a
=2
nj
>
>
>
>
p
>
<1
1p
sincn kj a
Q nj 2 cn kj

>
>
p
>
>
>
sin
c

k
nj
: c 1p
j a
n
k
n

Pmj

15a

15b

15c

15d

15e

q
q
p
K 2 b2m  sinh K 2 b2m a cos kj a

K 2 b2m kj

q
p
p
kj cosh K 2 b2m a sin kj a

15f

6287

J. Su et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 55 (2012) 62856290

2.3. Temperature distribution

The normalized energy equation may be written as

Based on the above velocity eld, the energy equation can be

written as

@2h @2h
2 a1 U  S

@ x2 @ y

qcp u

where

@T
kr2 T rE2 lU
@z

16

where q is the uid density, cp is the specic heat at constant pressure, T is the temperature, k is thermal conductivity, r is the electrical conductivity, and U is the viscous dissipation function. In Eq.
(16), the second term in right hand side represents a volumetric
heat generation due to Joule heating and the third term represents
a local volumetric heating due to viscous dissipation [9]. For distilled water, Gleeson [14] found the ratio of Joule heating to viscous
heating is very large. Hence, for the present analysis, we neglect the
viscous heating and consider only the Joule heating effects.
Assuming the EOF within the rectangular microchannel is thermally fully developed with constant physical properties, we have


@ T w z  Tx; y; z
0
@z T w z  T m z

17

where Tw(z) and Tm(z) are the local wall and the bulk temperatures,
respectively. Under imposed constant heat ux boundary conditions on the wall, we have

@Tx; y; z dT m z dT w z

const: and
@z
dz
dz
0

@ 2 Tx; y; z
@z2
18

Under these situations, energy equation (16) reduces to

dT
@2T @2T
qcp u m k

@x2 @y2
dz

!
rE2

19

The relevant boundary conditions for the energy equation are as

follows

@T0; y
0;
@x

q00s k

@TW; y
@x

20a

@Tx; 0
0;
@y

q00s k

@Tx; H
or TjyH T w z
@y

20b

where q00s is constant wall heat ux. It should be noted that for the
thermal fully developed ow in microchannels, usually the wall
axial thermal conduction cannot be neglected, especially at very
low Reynolds number. Thus the temperature on the wall is the function of z.
Furthermore, from an overall energy balance for an elemental
control volume on a length of duct dz, it follows that

4q00s H

dT
~ HWcp m dz
Wdz 4rE HW dz qu
dz
2

21

~ is axial mean velocity, and its dimensionless form can be

where u
written as


u

~
u

U eo


U dx dy
HW

dT m q00s H W rE2 HW

mcp
dz

23

Introducing the following dimensionless temperature for fully

developed ow

T  Tw
q00s H=k

rE2 H
q00s

24

HW

a1 


uW
u

26

The parameter S denotes the ratio of Joule heating to wall heat ux

from rectangular wall. Corresponding normalized temperature
boundary conditions are


@h0; y
0;
@ x


@ha; y
1
@ x

27a

@hx; 0
0;

@y

@hx; 1
1 or hjy1 0

@y

27b

Similar to our recent work [13], the solution of normalized temperature of Eq. (25) is


hx; y

1
X

p

cos kj xY j y

28

j1

 is expressed as
where the Y j y

p
1
2
1
 sinh kj y

p
C Pj C j
C y
  pj
 j
p cosh kj y
p
Y j y
kj cosh kj
2 kj
p
1
  1 Aa1 X
Bcosh kj y
Q nj

p 
kj
kj n1 F n K 2 c2n  kj
p


q
p
kj

  cosh kj y

cosh K 2 c2n y
2
K c2n  kj
p !
1
 sinh kj y

y
Aa1 X
Pmj
p

2
kj m1 Em b2m kj
!
p
p 

p
 sinh kj y

y
kj

  cosbm y
29
cosh kj y

 2
2
bm kj
where Pj

Rnj

p
1
Sj p cosh kj  1
kj

p
1
sinh kj ;
2

p
kj

30a


q
p
p
1
2
2  cosh
cosh
K

c
k

 sinh kj
j
n
2
2
2
K cn  kj

30b
T mj

1
Cj

p
p
p
kj
1
sinh kj  2
cosh kj  cosbm
2
bm kj

a1 A

p
 p
kj cosh kj

22

Rearranging Eq. (21), the axial bulk temperature gradient in the

thermally fully developed situation is


hx; y

R1 Ra
0

25

2
Cj

a1 A

"
1
X
Q nj J nj
n1

Fn

1
X

Q nj Rnj

n1

F n K 2 c2n  kj

1
X
Pmj Imj
m1

1
X

30c

#
30d

Em
Pmj T mj

2
m1 Em bm

kj

!
 BSj

30e

 can be obtained by inserting Eq. (29)

Finally, the solution of hx; y
into Eq. (28).
The dimensionless bulk temperature is given by

R1 Ra

Uhdx dy
hm R0 1 R0 a

Udx dy
0
0

31

The heat transfer rate can be expressed in terms of Nusselt number

as

6288

J. Su et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 55 (2012) 62856290

Fig. 2. Dimensionless temperature distribution for different ratio S (a = 1). (a) K = 5, S = 5, (b) K = 50, S = 5, (c) K = 5, S = 0, (d) K = 50, S = 0, (e) K = 5, S = 5, (f) K = 50, S = 5.

Nu

hDh
q00s Dh
1


hm
k
kT w  T m

where q00s hT w  T m ;

hm

32a
Tm  Tw
q00s H=k

32b

where h is heat transfer coefcient, Dh is so called hydrodynamic

diameter and Dh = H for a square microchannel. The Nusselt number
obtained in the present study and the one given in previous work
[15] are in quite agreement.
3. Numerical results and discussion
Two dimensionless parameters have been dened above for the
general ow behavior of thermally fully developed electroosmotic
ow through a rectangular microchannel. They are the ratio of the

characteristic scale of the rectangular microchannel to Debye

length K = Hj, and the ratio of Joule heating to wall heat ux
S rE2 H=q00s . The dependence of normalized temperature distributions and Nusselt number on K and S will be investigated over their
relevant ranges in this section. In all computational results, the
normalized wall zeta potential f 1 in order to use the linearized
PB equation.
Firstly, the normalized velocity distributions across the rectangular microchannel should be computed. For brevity, we ignored
these similar gures which can be found in Ref. [13]. Based on
velocity distributions, temperature distributions can be calculated.
Fig. 2 [(a), (c) and (e) for K = 5; (b), (d) and (f) for K = 50] illustrates the three dimensional temperature distributions for different ratio S (5, 0 and 5). Both positive and negative values of the
wall heat ux are considered, where the negative value of the S
corresponds to uid cooling scenario, and the positive value of

J. Su et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 55 (2012) 62856290

6289

Fig. 3. The variations of Nu with S, K and a. a = 1 for (a) and (b), (c) S = 2, (d) S = 2.

the S relates to uid heating case. From Fig. 2 we can see that a positive value of S (surface heating) will result in a greater temperature variation across the microchannel, while the opposite trend is
true for S (surface cooling) comparing with the case of S = 0.
Moreover, from the form of the surface heat ux q0s = koT(x,H)/
oy = h(Tw  Tm), which requires that the surface temperature gradient should be kept constant. Importantly, with an increasing Joule
heating parameter S, Tw also increases along with Tm in order to
maintain the constant heat ux condition.
For small electrokinetic width K [see Fig. 2 (a), (c) and (e)], the
variations of the amplitude of temperature h are larger than those
of large electrokinetic width K [see Fig. 2(b), (d) and (f)]. The reason
is that when the thickness of the EDL approaches to half height of
the microchannel, the effects of Joule heating are prominently felt
almost over the entire channel section, unlike for the case with
innitesimally thin EDL. These gures clearly demonstrate the
appreciable change in the local temperature across almost the entire channel cross section with increasing magnitude of the S due
to appreciable penetration of the EDL into the bulk uid for small
K. Moreover, the dependence of temperature on S is more signicant for a small K, while for larger K the temperature proles are
almost identical.
Fig. 3 shows fully developed Nusselt number Nu variations with
S, a and K. It can be seen from Fig. 3(a) that Nu monotonically
decreases with increases S whatever the electrokinetic width K is
larger or small. Increased K yields the increase of the Nu over the
rectangular microchannel cross section for a prescribed S. This
behavior may be explained by Fig. 3(b). Increasing values of S lead
to higher bulk temperatures with negative sign. This can be explained from Eq. (32) that the larger S produces to higher mean

temperature with negative sign, which leads to lower values of

Nusselt number. In addition, Fig. 3(c) and (d) shows Nu variations
with electrokinetic width K for different ratio a of the width to
height of the channel section for different S (2, 2). It can be seen
that Nu decreases with the increase of width to height ratio a no
matter whether S is positive or negative.

4. Conclusions
This study investigates the velocity and temperature distributions of the thermally fully developed electroosmotic ow through
a rectangular microchannel. Based on linear PB equation, Navier
Stokes equation and thermally fully developed energy equation,
analytical solutions of normalized velocity, temperature and Nusselt number are derived using the method of variable separation.
They greatly depend on the electrokinetic width K, width to height
ratio a and Joule heating to heat ux ratio S.
By numerical computations, we found that for prescribed K, increased S yields greater variation of the temperature over the rectangular microchannel cross section. The dependence of
temperature on S is more signicant for a small K, while at a larger
K the temperature proles are almost identical. In addition, we
illustrate the Nu number variations with Joule heating to heat ux
ratio S, width to height ratio a and electrokinetic width K. The Nu
number monotonically decreases with increases S no matter the
electrokinetic width K is larger or small. Increased K yields the increase of the Nu number over the rectangular microchannel cross
section for a given S. Moreover, Nu decreases with the increase of
width to height ratio a no matter whether S is positive or negative.

6290

J. Su et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 55 (2012) 62856290

Acknowledgments
The work was supported by Ph.D. Programs Foundation of Ministry of Education of China (No. 20111501120001), Opening fund of
State Key Laboratory of Nonlinear Mechanics, the National Natural
Science Foundation of China (No. 11062005), the Natural Science
Foundation of Inner Mongolia (Grant No: 2010BS0107), the
research start up fund for excellent talents at Inner Mongolia University (Grant No. Z20080211) and the support of Natural Science
Key Fund of Inner Mongolia (Grant No: 2009ZD01).
References
[1] G. karniadakis, A. Beskok, N. Aluru, Micorows and Nanoows: Fundamentals
and Simulation, Springer, New York, 2005.
[2] C.L. Rice, R. Whitehead, Electrokinetic ow in a narrow cylindrical capillary, J.
Phys. Chem. 69 (1965) 40174024.
[3] H.K. Tsao, Electroosmotic ow through an annulus, J. Colloid Interface Sci. 225
(2000) 247250.
[4] J.P. Hsu, C.Y. Kao, S.J. Tseng, C.J. Chen, Electrokinetic ow through an elliptical
microchannel: effects of aspect ratio and electrical boundary conditions, J.
Colloid Interface Sci. 248 (2002) 176184.
[5] C.Y. Wang, Y.H. Liu, C.C. Chang, Analytical solution of electro-osmotic ow in a
semicircular microchannel, Phys. Fluids 20 (2008) 063105.

[6] C. Yang, C.B. Ng, V. Chan, Transient analysis of electroosmotic ow in a slit

microchannel, J. Colloid Interface Sci. 248 (2002) 524527.
[7] Y.J. Jian, L.G. Yang, Q.S. Liu, Time periodic electro-osmotic ow through a
microannulus, Phys. Fluids 22 (2010) 042001.
[8] D. Maynes, B.W. Webb, Fully developed electro-osmotic heat transfer in
microchannels, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer 46 (2003) 13591369.
[9] S. Chakraborty, Analytical solutions of Nusselt number for thermally fully
developed ow in microtubes under a combined action of electroosmotic
forces and imposed pressure gradients, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer 49 (2006)
810813.
[10] A. Jain, M.K. Jensen, Analytical modeling of electrokinetic effects on ow and
heat transfer in microchannels, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer 50 (2007) 5161
5167.
[11] C.H. Chen, Thermal transport characteristics of mixed pressure and
electroosmotically driven ow in micro- and nanochannels with Joule
heating, J. Heat Transfer 131 (2009) 022401.
[12] C. Yang, D. Li, Analysis of electrokinetic effects on the liquid ow in rectangular
microchannel, Colloids Surface A: Physicochem. Eng. Aspects 143 (1998) 339
353.
[13] Y.J. Jian, Q.S. Liu, L.G. Yang, AC electroosmotic ow of generalized Maxwell
uids in a rectangular microchannel, J, Non-Newtomian Fluid Mech. 166
(2011) 13041314.
[14] J.P. Gleeson, Electroosmotic ows with random zeta potential, J. Colloid
Interface Sci. 249 (2002) 217226.
[15] A. Sadeghi, M.H. Saidi, Viscous dissipation effects on thermal transport
characteristics of combined pressure and electroosmotically driven ow in
microchannels, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer 53 (2010) 37823791.