Physics of Microfluidics

Survey of the physics underlying a wide range of microfluidic devices. Course will review basic, simple principles around fluid flow; convective heat and mass transfer; flows of bubbles, drops, and particles; Brownian particles; Taylor dispersion; capillarity; electrokinetics; mixing; jetting; and chemical reactions. Applications of these systems include molecular diagnostics, genetic and proteomic analysis, single-cell analysis, chemical detection, microelectronics cooling, and studies of basic physics and chemistry. We will review recent scientific literature with a goal of deducing simplified explanations, scaling arguments, and back-of-the-envelope approximations of the relevant physics and device performance.