In-water gas combustion for thrust production

The paper presents the results of experimental study for hydrodynamic processes occurring during combustion of a stoichiometric mixture propane-oxygen in combustion chambers with different configurations and submerged into water. The pulses of force acting upon a thrust wall were measured for different geometries: cylindrical, conic, hemispherical, including the case of gas combustion near a flat thrust wall. After a single charge of stoichiometric mixture propane-oxygen is burnt near the thrust wall, the process of cyclic generation of force pulses develops. The first pulse is generated due to pressure growth during gas combustion, and the following pulses are the result of hydrodynamic pulsations of the gaseous cavity. Experiments demonstrated that efficient generation of thrust occurs if all bubble pulsations are used during combustion of a single gas combustion. In the series of experiments, the specific impulse on the thrust wall was in the range 10⁴–10⁵ s (10⁵–10⁶ m/s) with account for positive and negative components of impulse.     

Pulsed ultrasonic spectroscopy of gas bubbles

Transient processes associated with gas bubble excitation by ultrasonic pulses are investigated based on the numerical solution to the Rayleigh-Plesset equation. The results are used to consider ultrasonic methods of gas bubble detection and sizing in liquids and biological tissues on the basis of linear and nonlinear bubble properties. The possibility of frequency separation of signals received from bubbles with different sizes in the case of their pulsed excitation is experimentally demonstrated.     

Ordering of gas bubbles during light ion gas implantation

There have been interesting observations about ordering of microstructures during irradiation. The formation of void lattices is amongst the better known examples. Ordering has also been observed in small gas filled bubbles formed during low energy light ion implantation in the energy range 30–100 keV. The basic underlying mechanism for ordering of gas bubbles has not been clearly understood so far. We identify in this paper a basic instability in the growth kinetics of such bubbles which can develop during irradiation. This instability is shown to be associated with the interstitial production due to the high pressure inside these bubbles and their differential bias due to the strain field interactions with vacancies and interstitials. It is shown that such an instability leads to a selection of a wavelength scale which agrees with the observed lattice parameter.     

Volume pulsations of gas bubbles in a liquid

When a bubble of vapor in a superheated liquid is disturbed, it does not grow steadily but continuously pulsates. The pulsations are damped, the decrement depending on the relative evaporation or condensation rate. The authors explain the sound emitted by the bubbles.     

Nonlinear oscillations of gas bubbles in viscoelastic fluids

Nonlinear oscillations of gas bubbles in viscoelastic fluids of a three-constant Oldroyd model are theoretically investigated. The equation of motion for a bubble in a viscoelastic fluid subject to a pulsating pressure, and the pressure equation at the bubble wall are obtained. By numerical calculations on these equations, the effects of relaxation time and retardation time on frequency response curves, and the relation between the maximum pressure at the bubble wall and the initial radius of the bubble are clarified.     

Instabilities in a liquid-fluidized bed of gas bubbles

Gas bubbles in an aqueous foam can be unjammed, or fluidized, by introducing a forced flow of the continuous liquid phase at a sufficiently high rate. We observe that the resulting bubble dynamics are spatially inhomogeneous, exhibiting a sequence of instabilities vs increasing flow rate. First irregular swirls appear, then a single convective roll, and finally a series of stratified convection rolls each with a different average bubble size.     

Bernoulli excitation and detection of gas bubbles.

A simple method is proposed for detecting and sizing bubbles in pipeline fluid flow. This is based on changing the pressure of the fluid, which in turn excites volume oscillations in the bubble. If the change in pressure is of sufficient brevity and magnitude, the transient distortion results in excitation of the bubble into radiative oscillation at its natural frequency. In a moving fluid, the Bernoulli equation predicts that such a pressure change can be achieved through a suitable gradient in the flow velocity. In the experiments described here, this is achieved by altering the cross-sectional area of the pipe in which the fluid is flowing. We demonstrate the efficacy of this excitation method and, by detecting the radiated sound using a nearby hydrophone, determine the size of individual bubbles from their characteristic oscillation frequency.     

Acoustic manifestations of gas hydrate shelled bubbles

The hydrocarbon seeps emitting buoyant bubble plumes from seafloor vents—gas flares have been actively investigated in different regions of the World Ocean, in particular, on the Sakhalin slope in the Sea of Okhotsk. The gas flares can be easily detected by regular echo sounders, because the scattering cross section of a gas bubble is large. Within the gas-hydrate stability zone—for high hydrostatic pressures and low temperatures, methane-hydrate ice skins are formed on rising seep bubbles which are typically methane. The objective of the present study was to develop a suitable model describing rheological characteristics of gas-hydrate shell and to analyze acoustic manifestations of such bubbles for the frequency range used in marine field experiments.     

Transcillatory heat transfer in a liquid with gas bubbles

The article describes the model of transcillatory heat transfer induced by gas bubbles buoyant in liquid. The temperature problem is reduced to the equivalent integral equation, and the velocity field in liquid phase is presented as structures of running and stationary waves. The relations for computing the coefficient of transcillatory transfer have been found.     

Comparing cleaning effects of gas and vapor bubbles in ultrasonic fields

The dynamic actions of cavitation bubbles in ultrasonic fields can clean surfaces. Gas and vapor cavitation bubbles exhibit different dynamic behaviors in ultrasonic fields, yet little attention has been given to the distinctive cleaning effects of gas and vapor bubbles. We present an experimental investigation of surface cleaning by gas and vapor bubbles in an ultrasonic field. Using high-speed videography, we found that the primary motions of gas and vapor bubbles responsible for surface cleaning differ. Our cleaning tests under different contamination conditions in terms of contaminant adhesion strength and surface wettability reveal that vapor and gas bubbles are more effective at removing contaminants with strong and weak adhesion, respectively, and furthermore that hydrophobic substrates are better cleaned by vapor bubbles. Our study not only provides a better physical understanding of the ultrasonic cleaning process, but also proposes novel techniques to improve ultrasonic cleaning by selectively employing gas and vapor bubbles depending on the characteristics of the surface to be cleaned.     

Investigating an annular nozzle on combustion products of hydrocarbon fuels

Full-scale and computational experiments were used to investigate the flows in the jet thrust unit with annular nozzle and deflector in the form of a spherical segment. The used working gas was the combustion products of air mixtures with acetylene, gas-phase aviation kerosene, and natural gas. Experimental studies were carried out in a hot-shot wind tunnel in the range of stagnation pressure from 0.48 to 2.05 MPa. The calculations for the cases of combustion products outflow in terrestrial and high altitude conditions were performed with the original computer program that used the Euler and Navier-Stokes systems supplemented by equations of chemical kinetics. It was found that the thrust of the jet module with an annular nozzle at high altitude almost twice exceeds the sound nozzle thrust, but is lesser (about 25 %) than the thrust of the ideal calculated Laval nozzle; the difference therewith decreases markedly with the decrease of flight altitude and stagnation pressure.     

Acoustically coupled gas bubbles in fluids: time-domain phenomena.

In previous work [C. Feuillade, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 98, 1178-1190 (1995)] a coupled oscillator formalism was introduced for describing collective resonances, scattering, and superresonances, of multiple gas bubbles in a fluid. Subsequently, time-domain investigations of the impulse response of coupled systems have disclosed the exact conditions which determine whether the ensemble scattering behavior should be described using: either (a), a multiple scattering; or (b), a self-consistent methodology. The determining factor is the Q of the individual scatterers, and their typical spatial separations in the medium. For highly damped or sparse systems, e.g., scattering from loose schools of swimbladder fish, or from a gassy seabed containing entrained bubbles, the multiple scatter counting approach should be applicable. For more strongly coupled systems, e.g., a dense cloud of resonating bubbles in the water column, energy exchange may be due primarily to radiative cycling rather than scattering, in which case a self-consistent approach is indicated. The result has implications for both volume and bottom scattering applications.     

Investigation of azimuthal staging concepts in annular gas turbines

In this work, the influence of azimuthal staging concepts on the thermoacoustic behavior of annular combustion chambers is assessed theoretically and numerically. Staging is a well-known and effective method to abate thermoacoustic pulsations in combustion chambers. However, in the case of, for example, fuel staging the associated inhomogeneity of equivalence ratio may result in increased levels of NO_x emissions. In order to minimize this unwanted effect a staging concept is required in which the transfer functions of the burners are changed while affecting the equivalence ratio as little as possible. In order to achieve this goal, a theoretical framework for predicting the influence of staging concepts on pulsations has been developed. Both linear and nonlinear analytical approaches are presented and it is shown that the dynamics of azimuthal modes can be described by coupled Van der Pol oscillators. A criterion based on the thermoacoustic coupling strength and on the asymmetry degree provides the modal behavior in the annular combustor, i.e. standing or traveling waves. The model predictions have been verified by numerical simulations of a heavy-duty gas turbine using an in-house thermoacoustic network-modeling tool. The interaction between the heat release of the flame and the acoustic field was modeled using measured transfer functions and source terms. These numerical simulations confirmed the original theoretical considerations.     

Stationary soliton waves in a liquid with heat-conducting gas bubbles

Formation of an undamped soliton wave in the process of propagation of sound perturbations in a liquid with uniformly distributed gas bubbles is first revealed. The stationary soliton wave exists only in the presence of two pairs of competing factors, one of which is a balance between the nonlinearity of the medium and the linear wave dispersion, and another is a balance between the heat inflow into and outflow from the gas phase. The thermodynamic convertibility of dissipation of gas bubbles in the process of soliton wave propagation is revealed. The Korteweg-de Vries equation is derived for adiabatic bubbles. It differs radically from the Korteweg-de Vries equation obtained by Van Wijngaarden. __________ Translated from Izvestiya Vysshikh Uchebnykh Zavedenii, Fizika, No. 6, pp. 84–88, June, 2006.