Taylor dispersion

Taylor dispersion or Taylor diffusion is an apparent or effective diffusion of some scalar field arising on the large scale due to the presence of a strong, confined, zero-mean shear flow on the small scale. Essentially, the shear acts to smear out the concentration distribution in the direction of the flow, enhancing the rate at which it spreads in that direction.[1][2][3] The effect is named after the British fluid dynamicist G. I. Taylor, who described the shear-induced dispersion for large Peclet numbers. The analysis was later generalized by Rutherford Aris for arbitrary values of the Peclet number. The dispersion process is sometimes also referred to as the Taylor-Aris dispersion.

The canonical example is that of a simple diffusing species in uniform Poiseuille flow through a uniform circular pipe with no-flux boundary conditions.

  1. ^ Probstein R (1994). Physicochemical Hydrodynamics.
  2. ^ Chang, H.C., Yeo, L. (2009). Electrokinetically Driven Microfluidics and Nanofluidics. Cambridge University Press.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  3. ^ Kirby, B.J. (2010). Micro- and Nanoscale Fluid Mechanics: Transport in Microfluidic Devices. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-11903-0.