Bubble-induced relaxation in high-pressure microfluidic systems

This work reported an analysis of a noticeable relaxation phenomenon caused by undesirable air bubbles in high-pressure microfluidic systems. A model with compression of air bubble considered was established to address the experimental observed pressure relaxation. The results indicated that the dominative factors were flow rate, flow resistance and initial diameter of the trapped air bubble. Meanwhile, the calculated relaxation times in different cases provided a design guideline for high-pressure microfluidic chip to avoid the long-term pressure relaxation.