Visualization of the two-layered electroosmotic flow and its EHD instability in T-channels by micro PIV

An interfacial instability has recently been observed for the DC- and AC-powered electroosmotic flows of the two miscible electrolyte layers having different concentrations in microchannels. It is rather contrary to our common belief that the flow inside a microchannel is generally stable due to the dominant role of the viscous damping. In this work, we visualized the electroosmotic flow inside a T-channel to validate the numerical predictions. It is clearly shown that the strong vortices (which characterize the interface shapes) are generated at the interface of the two fluids, as was predicted in the numerical analysis.