Multiphase Flow

Vipin Uniyal April 24, 2012

Multiphase ow provide several mechanisms for enhancing and extending the Performance of single-phase microuidic systems. The long diusion times and broad dispersion bands associated with single-phase pressure-driven ow can be reduced by adding a second, immiscible, uid stream. Multiphase ow form when two or more partially or not miscible uids are brought in contact and subjected to a pressure gradient. The resulting ow display a rich phase behavior, e.g. as suspended droplets, bubbles, slugs or thin llms. The ow behavior is dependent on the relative ow rates of the uid phases involved, the resulting interaction between gravitational, interfacial, inertial and viscous forces and the wetting behavior of the channel walls. The alternating succession of immiscible uid segments will play a particularly important role. Such ow are also known as segmental ow. Number of favorable conditions, including enhanced mixing, increased mass transfer across phase boundaries and reduced dispersion are associated with such ow. Multiphase microchemical systems generally take advantage of the large interfacial areas, rapid mixing and reduced mass transfer limitations. Segmented ow of liquid slugs that are separated by gas bubbles improve synthesis and overcoating of nanoparticles with narrow size distributions. Liquid droplets also allow the isolation and concentration of protein solutions in crystallization studies

dynamic contact angle

Contact angles are static or dynamic depending on whether the liquid-solid-air boundary is stationary or moving during the measurement. Dynamic contact angles can be divided into those where the motion is impressed on this three-phase boundary and those where the motion is caused by the interfacial forces themselves. now from tanner law it is clear that dierence between dynamic and static contact angle is of sign of Ca so we can write advancing and receding angle as 1 A | Ca | (1) a s + = 2 3 s 1 A | Ca | r s (2) = 2 3 s above equation conrm that advancing dynamic contact angle is grater then the static one while receding dynamic contact angle is lower than the static one

Plug ow in capillary

the pressure drop always taken in the direction of uid ow so depending on the congration shown above if a is grater than /2 then there is positive pressure drop associated with advancing interface. Similarly if r is less than /2 then the pressure drop associated with receding font is also positive. negative preeure dop wil be there in opposite case.

Wetting

The anity of liquid for solids is reered as Wettability of uids. it is quantied by contact angle and in the limit of 0the liquid said to completly wet the surface. Now consider total change in Helmholtz free energy is equal to sum of changes in bluk uid and in the interfaces region which can be written as dF = lv dAlv + sl dAsl + sv dAsv 2 (3)

now shift in interface that results in increase of area of solid liquid interface in turns results in equal reduction in solid vapor interface area dAsv = dAsl now if we further assume that liquid vapor interface is spherical cap then dAlv = dAsl Cos so nally we get F = lv Cos + sl sv (6) Asl this gives rate of change of total free energy with changing Asl for constant drop volume and temperature. At equlibiriam this equation crossponds to Youngs equation. Now let us dene the spreading coecient Spls as Spls = sv lv sl so now we can write F = (Spls + lv (1 Cos)) Asl (7) (5) (4)

(8)

so for fully wetting liquid( = 0) F = Spls (9) Asl Now if Spls is positive then free energy decrease with increasing Asl which is necessary for instantanious spreading. if liquid does not spread and establish a equilibriam contact angle then Spls = lv (1 Cos) (10) which indicate that Spls must be negative. So negative value of Spls means liquid will partially wet the surface.

Roughness importance

A surface is superhydrophobic if it has a water contact angle above 150. These surfaces are water repellent. These surfaces with low contact angle hysteresis (less than 10) also have a self cleaning eect, called Lotus Eect. Water droplets roll o the surface and take contaminants with them. The self cleaning surfaces are of interest in various applications, e.g., self cleaning windows, windshields, exterior paints for buildings, navigation-ships and utensils, roof tiles, textiles, solar panels and reduction of drag in uid ow, e. g. in Micro/nanochannels. Also, superhydrophobic surface can be used for energy conservation and energy conversion. When two hydrophilic surfaces come into contact, condensation of water vapor from environment forms meniscus bridges at asperity contacts which lead to an intrinsic attractive force. This may lead to high adhesion and stiction. Therefore, superhydrophobic surfaces are desirable. Superhydrophobic surfaces can be achieved either by selecting low surface energy materials/coatings or by introducing roughness.

Lotos Eect

A lot of plants showed a combination of microstructure and nanostructure on their surface which minimizes the contact area with anything that came into contact with the surface. Microstructure resists capillary waves present at the liquid-air interface. Nanostructure prevents nano droplets from lling the valleys between asperities and pin the droplet. The leaves of a lotus plant showed epidermal cells on its rough surface covered with wax crystals. Thus the leaf surface consists of micro bumps formed by convex papilla epidermal cells covered with a 3 D epicuticular wax (crystalline tubules composed of a mixture of secondary alcohol nonacosan10-ol and Nonacosanediols) on surface which creates nanobumps. The wax crystals provide a water-repellent layer, which is enhanced by the surface roughness according to the models of Wenzel and Cassie. The wax crystals are badly wettable. As a result of this, water droplets on the surface tend to minimize the contact between the surface and the drop, forming a spherical droplet. Contaminations on the surface are usually larger than the cellular structure of the leaves, leaving the particle resting on the tips of the latter. As the result, the contact area and thus the interfacial interaction is minimized .When a water droplet rolls over the contamination, energy through absorption is gained, even is the particle is hydrophobic. The particle is then removed from the surface if the energy gained by absorption to the water droplet is larger than the energy it costs to remove the particle from the leaves, which is usually the case due to the small contact area. Superhydrophobic leaves:-Nelumbo nucifera (lotus) and colocasia esculenta Hydrophilic leaves:-Fagus sylvatica and magnolia grandiora

Roughness Parameter

the roughness factor r is dened as the ratio of the area of the actual surface to that of a smooth surface having the same geometric shape and dimensions r= actual geometric surf ace surf ace (11)