Chaotic motion generation with applications to liquid mixing

This work proposes a practical approach to applying more complex perturbations into a liquid mixing process by using sampled output signals from a chaotic circuit. The mixing process in one of the most widely utilized mixing devices, the stirred tank, is considered. A motor-driven liquid mixer based on the stirred tank model is designed and implemented for carrying out intensive experiments. Different signals, such as DC signals, sinusoidal wave signals and chaotic signals, have been tested for driving the motor, which produces the intended motion perturbations, including constant, periodic and chaotic motion patterns. Analysis on different outcomes under several mixing conditions gives some sensible relationships between the motion perturbation patterns and the liquid mixing efficiency, showing the superiority of chaotic perturbations over the others. Chaotic signals are considered the best choice for achieving mixing efficiency from a practical point of view, when they are properly used for controlling the liquid mixers.