TY - JOUR
T1 - Electrical Resistance of Nanochannel-Microchannel Systems
T2 - An Exact Solution
AU - Green, Yoav
AU - Abu-Rjal, Ramadan
AU - Eshel, Ran
N1 - Funding Information:
Y.G. acknowledges the support of the Ilse Katz Institute for Nanoscale Science & Technology. R.A.-R. acknowledges financial support from Zvi Yanay fellowship.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 American Physical Society.
PY - 2020/7/1
Y1 - 2020/7/1
N2 - Current paradigm suggests that the Ohmic electrical response of nanochannel-microchannel systems is determined solely by the nanochannel while the effects of the adjacent microchannels are negligible. However, recent works have challenged this paradigm and have shown that at low concentrations the microchannels contribute in a non-negligible manner. As such, the two favored models used to explain experiments are inadequate in describing realistic nanochannel-microchannel systems. To partially reconcile some of these issues, two newer nanochannel-microchannel models were derived and suggested as a suitable replacement for the nanochannel-dominant models. Unfortunately, these two models are limited to either very low or very high concentrations. In this work, we review these four leading models. We discuss their key assumptions, advantages, shortcomings, and present a knowledge gap between all models pertaining to the effects of the microchannel resistance for all concentrations. To overcome this gap, we derive an analytical solution that accounts for the effects of the microchannels and holds for all concentrations. This solution unifies three of the existing models where we show that they are limiting cases of our more general solution. We are also able to disqualify the fourth model. Our derived solution shows remarkable correspondence to simulations and experiments. The insights from this unifying model can be used to improve the design of any nanofluidic based systems.
AB - Current paradigm suggests that the Ohmic electrical response of nanochannel-microchannel systems is determined solely by the nanochannel while the effects of the adjacent microchannels are negligible. However, recent works have challenged this paradigm and have shown that at low concentrations the microchannels contribute in a non-negligible manner. As such, the two favored models used to explain experiments are inadequate in describing realistic nanochannel-microchannel systems. To partially reconcile some of these issues, two newer nanochannel-microchannel models were derived and suggested as a suitable replacement for the nanochannel-dominant models. Unfortunately, these two models are limited to either very low or very high concentrations. In this work, we review these four leading models. We discuss their key assumptions, advantages, shortcomings, and present a knowledge gap between all models pertaining to the effects of the microchannel resistance for all concentrations. To overcome this gap, we derive an analytical solution that accounts for the effects of the microchannels and holds for all concentrations. This solution unifies three of the existing models where we show that they are limiting cases of our more general solution. We are also able to disqualify the fourth model. Our derived solution shows remarkable correspondence to simulations and experiments. The insights from this unifying model can be used to improve the design of any nanofluidic based systems.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85089503160&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1103/PhysRevApplied.14.014075
DO - 10.1103/PhysRevApplied.14.014075
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85089503160
SN - 2331-7019
VL - 14
JO - Physical Review Applied
JF - Physical Review Applied
IS - 1
M1 - 014075
ER -