Electrokinetic flow of fluids with pressure-dependent viscosity in a nanotube

The electrokinetic flow of fluids with pressure-dependent viscosity is investigated through a nanotube. Based on a linear dependent relationship between viscosity and pressure, the axial and radial velocities, pressure, streaming potential, and electrokinetic energy conversion efficiency are obtained by using the perturbation method. The results show the pressure-dependent viscosity effect can enhance the magnitude of streaming potential. In addition, the pressure distribution exhibits obvious nonlinearity for larger pressure-viscosity coefficient. Finally, large pressure-viscosity coefficient results in low energy conversion efficiency. The present asymptotic analytical solutions can be viewed as an effective method for checking the numerical schemes that are developed for flows in more complex situations.