Micro-mixing in chemical reactors: A perspective

Micro-mixing is an important mechanism, which works simultaneously with macro-mixing in chemical reactors in process industries, for achieving the best selectivity with respect to desired products. In about a half century, a huge amount of data and knowledge has been accumulated from theoretical and experimental studies on micro-mixing. Nevertheless, those results are mostly composites of simplified theoretical and empirical models, and the true nature of interactions of flow inhomogeneity and micro-mixing with chemical reaction has not been fully unveiled. This article reviews the progress in micro-mixing study in chemical reactors to date. A few important topics related to the nature, experimental evaluation, and numerical simulation of micro-mixing are addressed. Some suggestions are given hopefully to motivate more chemical engineers to devote their efforts to better understanding of micro-mixing in chemical reactors.