Metamaterials are micro- or nanostructured materials designed by transformation physics, which can manipulate energy flow in an unprecedented manner. Here, for the first time, we introduce a metamaterial hydrodynamic flow concentrator that can significantly focus fluid flow into a target area. The flow fields with the concentrator are numerically simulated with a viscosity tensor calculated from the coordinate-transformation of the Stokes equations. Based on the modeling, a metamaterial microstructure for the hydrodynamic flow concentrator is designed and fabricated as a microfluidic device and its function is experimentally validated showing the increased flow rate inside the metamaterial. We envisage that the concept of hydrodynamic flow concentrator can be applied to improve the harvesting efficiency of hydrodynamic energy.

超材料是通过转换物理学设计的微结构或纳米结构材料，可以以前所未有的方式操纵能量流。在这里，我们首次引入了一种超材料流体动流集中器，可以将流体流集中到目标区域。使用由斯托克斯方程的坐标变换计算出的粘度张量，对带有集中器的流场进行数值模拟。基于该模型，设计并制造了用于流体动流浓缩器的超材料微观结构，并将其构造为微流体装置，并通过实验验证了其功能，表明超材料内部的流速增加。我们设想可以使用流体动力流集中器的概念来提高流体动力能量的收集效率。