A drop translating in the presence of an electric field is studied analytically. The flow is a combination of a Hadamard-Rybczynski and a Taylor circulation due to the translation and electric field, respectively. We consider chaotic advection that is generated by (1) tilting and (2) time-dependent modulation of the electric field. For the analysis we consider small perturbations in time and space to what is otherwise an integrable flow. By using a robust analytical technique we find an adiabatic invariant (AI) for the system by averaging the equations of motion. The chaotic advection is due to quasirandom jumps of the AI after crossing the separatrix of the unperturbed flow. We demonstrate that the asymptotic analysis leads to a set of criteria that can be used to optimize stirring in these systems.

• Received 11 May 2015
• Corrected 17 March 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.92.023030