Numerical simulation of polygonal particles moving in incompressible viscous fluids

A two-dimensional coupled lattice Boltzmann immersed boundary discrete element method is introduced for the simulation of polygonal particles moving in incompressible viscous fluids. A collision model of polygonal particles is used in the discrete element method. Instead of a collision model of circular particles, the collision model used in our method can deal with particles of more complex shape and efficiently simulate the effects of shape on particle–particle and particle–wall interactions. For two particles falling under gravity, because of the edges and corners, different collision patterns for circular and polygonal particles are found in our simulations. The complex vortexes generated near the corners of polygonal particles affect the flow field and lead to a difference in particle motions between circular and polygonal particles. For multiple particles falling under gravity, the polygonal particles easily become stuck owing to their corners and edges, while circular particles slip along contact areas. The present method provides an efficient approach for understanding the effects of particle shape on the dynamics of non-circular particles in fluids.     

Cinematographic investigations of the explosively driven dispersion and ignition of solid particles

We present results of an experimental study of blast wave propagation and particle dispersion induced by a free-field detonation of spherical charges made of a 125 g C-4 explosive surrounded by inert or reactive particles. Visualization of the flow was performed with a high-frame-rate video camera. Background oriented Schlieren (BOS) methods were adapted to process the images that allowed the detection of the shock waves. BOS analysis also revealed that particles form agglomerates, which may generate precursor perturbations on the recorded pressure signals. While inert glass particles notably delay the shock, the combustion of aluminium particles can accelerate it, especially if they are small atomized or flaked particles. When a mixture of inert glass particles with reactive particles is dispersed, the agglomerates are formed by coalescence of both materials.     

An enhanced treatment of boundary conditions in implicit smoothed particle hydrodynamics简

In this work, an enhanced treatment of the solid boundaries is proposed for smoothed particle hydrodynamics with implicit time integration scheme （Implicit SPH）. Three types of virtual particles, i.e., boundary particles, image particles and mirror particles, are used to impose boundary conditions. Boundary particles are fixed on the solid boundary, and each boundary particle is associated with two fixed image particles inside the fluid domain and two fixed mirror particles outside the fluid domain. The image particles take the flow properties through fluid particles with moving least squares （MLS） interpolation and the properties of mirror particles can be obtained by the corresponding image particles. A repulsive force is also applied for boundary particles to prevent fluid particles from unphysical penetra- tion through solid boundaries. The new boundary treatment method has been validated with five numerical examples. All the numerical results show that Implicit SPH with this new boundary-treatment method can obtain accurate results for non-Newtonian fluids as well as Newtonian fluids, and this method is suitable for complex solid boundaries and can be easily extended to 3D problems.     

双柱状颗粒在线性剪切流场中的动力学分析

为研究柱状颗粒在线性剪切流场中的运动状态和受力情况,本文以颗粒长径比为2,颗粒之间的初始距离ΔS_Py=4D为例,基于直接力浸入边界法数值模拟了双柱状颗粒在三维线性剪切流场中的运动过程。根据模拟结果分析了柱状颗粒周围流场参数分布,在考虑壁面对颗粒的影响和颗粒之间相互影响的条件下,研究了颗粒的受力和运动的变化,探索了流体曳力导致柱状颗粒迁移和转动的规律。研究结果表明,双柱状颗粒在线性剪切流场中易向速度大的流体区域运动;前后两颗粒运动状态和轨迹不同,颗粒之间距离较近时,曳力会产生较大的波动;只有当颗粒在壁面附近时,滞后颗粒才能追上领先颗粒,两颗粒发生牵引、翻滚和分离过程。     

Mixing and segregation of solid particles in a conical spouted bed: Effect of particle size and density

In this work, the mixing and segregation of binary mixtures of particles with different sizes and densities in a pseudo-2D spouted bed were studied experimentally. A binary mixture of solid particles including sand, gypsum, and polyurethane was used. To determine the particles mass fraction, and their mixing and segregation in the bed, an image-processing technique was developed and used. Important hydrodynamic parameters, such as the axial and radial segregation profiles of the solid particles, were measured. The effects of air velocity, particle size, and particle mass fraction were also evaluated. The flow regime in the spouted bed and the time required for reaching the equilibrium state of the solid particles were discussed. The results showed that the segregation of solid particles and the time to equilibrium both decreased when the air velocity increased to much larger than the minimum spouting velocity. The axial segregation increased with the diameter ratio of the particles. Upon completion of the test, coarse particles were concentrated mainly in the spout region, while fine particles were aggregated in the annulus region. Examination of the flow pattern in the spouted bed showed that the particles near the wall had longer flow paths, while those near the spout region had shorter flow paths.     

Effect of mixing structure on the hygroscopic behavior of ultrafine ammonium sulfate particles mixed with succinic acid and levoglucosan

Understanding the interactions between water and atmospheric aerosols is critical for estimating their impact on the radiation budget and cloud formation. The hygroscopic behavior of ultrafine (<100 nm) ammonium sulfate particles internally mixed with either succinic acid (slightly soluble) or levoglucosan (soluble) in different mixing structures (core-shell vs. well-mixed) were measured using a hygroscopicity tandem differential mobility analyzer (HTDMA). During the hydration process (6–92% relative humidity (RH)), the size of core-shell particles (ammonium sulfate and succinic acid) remained unchanged until a slow increase in particle size occurred at 79% RH; however, an abrupt increase in size (i.e., a clear deliquescence) was observed at ∼72% RH for well-mixed particles with a similar volume fraction to the core-shell particles (80:20 by volume). This increase might occur because the shell hindered the complete dissolution of the core-shell particles below 92% RH. The onset RH value was lower for the ammonium sulfate/levoglucosan core-shell particles than the ammonium sulfate/succinic acid core-shell particles due to levoglucosan's higher solubility relative to succinic acid. The growth factor (GF) of the core-shell particles was lower than that of the well-mixed particles, while the GF of the ammonium sulfate/levoglucosan particles was higher than that of ammonium sulfate/succinic acid particles with the same volume fractions. As the volume fraction of the organic species increased, the GF decreased. The data suggest that the mixing structure is also important when determining hygroscopic behavior of the mixed particles.     

The Penetration Processes of Red Mud Filtrate in a Porous Medium by Seepage

This study investigated the effect of flow velocity, the concentration of red mud particles, and the concentration of \(\hbox {OH}^{-}\) ions on the penetration processes of red mud filtrate with fine particles in a porous medium by seepage. The results show that the peak concentrations of the breakthrough curves (BTCs) of red mud particles with high alkalinity are much higher than that with low alkalinity, indicating that the existence of \(\hbox {OH}^{-}\) ions enhances the repulsive interaction between red mud particles and between red mud particles and the matrix and promotes the migration of red mud particles. The red mud particles are more easily absorb onto the surface of porous medium or embedded in the matrix due to the greater adsorption between red mud particles and porous dielectric matrix than silicon powders. The penetration velocity of these red mud particles is often slower than water velocity due to the capture effect by straining and the detours path effect, especially in the case of high injection concentration and low alkalinity. Both the recovery rate and modal size of recovered particles increase with the increase in flow velocity, and the recovery rate of particles with high alkalinity is higher than that of particles with low alkalinity, which can be attributed to the stronger repulsive interaction between particles and between particles and the matrix. An analytical solution for the migration of particles in a porous medium in which the contaminant intensity varies with time has been developed from the elementary solution, and the predicted BTCs for a repeated three-pulse injection are in good accordance with the experimental results.     

Synthesis and surface modification of magnetic particles for application in biotechnology and biomedicine

Magnetic particles have numerous applications in biotechnology and biomedicine. In this paper we reviewed the synthesis, surface modification and some applications of magnetic particles with focus on their synthesis and surface modification. Various methods have been developed for the production of magnetic particles （magnetic nanoparticles and magnetic composite particles）. For future application magnetic particles must be modified to obtain stability and surface functional groups. Finally, the application of magnetic particles in magnetic separation, drug delivery, hyperthermia, and magnetic resonance imaging are discussed.     

Direct numerical simulation of modulation of isotropic turbulence by poly‐dispersed particles

A direct numerical simulation technique based on two‐way coupling is presented to study a particle‐laden, decaying isotropic turbulent flow. Physical characteristics of turbulence modulation because of the mono‐dispersed (i.e., particles with single Stokes number) and poly‐dispersed particles (i.e., particles with more than one Stokes number) were investigated. A scale dependent effective viscosity that summarizes the aspects of the interaction between the velocity field and particles is defined in the study. Particles of Stokes number (St) 3.2,6.4 and 12.8 were used in performing the simulations. Poly‐dispersed particles were acquired by mixing particles of two different Stokes numbers at a time. As a whole, decay of turbulence because of the poly‐dispersed particles is observed to be larger than that of the decay of turbulence because of the mono‐dispersed particles. Simulations of poly‐dispersed particle indicate nonlinear characteristics in the modification of the temporal evolution of turbulence energy and dissipation. The scale dependent effective viscosity, which correlates with the energy spectrum plot, indicates that the decay of turbulence is mostly observed at the intermediate scales of turbulence. The effective viscosity for the simulations of the poly‐dispersed particles was calculated to be higher than that of the simulations of the mono‐dispersed particles. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effect of particle shape on micro- and mesostructure evolution of granular assemblies under biaxial loading conditions

Discrete element method (DEM) numerical biaxial tests on samples with different particle shapes are performed to investigate how the multiscale evolves with varying particle shape. The samples used in such simulations are composed of circular, square, and elongated particles, respectively. For the numerical results, analyses are conducted in terms of microscopic evolution, i.e. particle rotation and evolution of fabric, and mesoscopic evolution, i.e. the evolution of loops and improved clustering coefficient. At the microscale, the mean particle rotation of circular particles is remarkably larger than those of square and elongated particles, and the shear band localization phenomenon is more obvious when the aspect ratio (AR) decreases. Considering the fabric evolving with particle shape, the value of anisotropy gradually increases when particle shape becomes irregular, and contacts of circular particles are pronouncedly less than those of irregular particles from the coordination number and curves of degree distribution. At the mesoscale, when the particle relationship is considered, the isotropic particles (i.e. circular and square particles) have similar evolutions of loops and modified clustering coefficient, whereas the elongated particles have remarkable three loops and modified clustering coefficient, which are both larger than those of isotropic particles.     

微流道内椭圆粒子黏弹性聚焦数值模拟研究

黏弹性聚焦技术借助微尺度黏弹性流体的惯性和弹性耦合效应,能够实现生物粒子在流道中心的单一位置聚焦排列,被认为是未来生物粒子计数以及检测的理想预处理单元,因而引起了广泛的关注．自然界中的生物粒子往往是非球形的,故而研究不同形状粒子在黏弹性流体中的迁移特性具有十分重要的价值．本文通过格子玻尔兹曼方法耦合浸入边界法,对椭球粒子在直流道内黏弹性流体中的聚焦行为进行了系统的数值模拟研究．结果表明,面积相同但长径比不同的椭圆粒子在黏弹性流体中有不同的旋转周期与迁移速度．长径比更大的粒子旋转周期更长,且长径比大于3.5 的粒子甚至不再有明显的旋转．长径比更大的粒子上下两侧的黏弹性力分布更加平缓,受到指向流道中心的弹性力更小,使得粒子横向迁移速度更慢从而导致了长径比不同的椭圆粒子聚焦至流道中心所需时间的差异．此外,Weissenberg 数Wi 的增加同样能够减弱粒子的旋转,使得长径比稍小的粒子也能和长径比为1.0 的圆形粒子产生明显的分离．上述数值模拟的结论,为不同长径比粒子在黏弹性流体中的聚焦与分选应用提供了重要的理论指导．     

Effects of gas flow and turbulent diffusion on the centrifugal classification of fine particles

Tthe mass movement of fine particles and changes in their trajectories under the effect of centrifugal, gravitational, and aerodynamic forces is studied by numerical modeling of turbulent swirling flow. The effect of turbulent migration of solid particles due to pulsating gas flow velocities on the aerodynamics of particles and, consequently, on the efficiency of the process of separation of particles by size is analyzed. The studies revealed the behavior laws of probability curve of separation of particles by size and showed the effect of regime and geometric parameters on the process of classification of fine powders.     

Multi-level DEM study on silo discharge behaviors of non-spherical particles

The silo discharge of non-spherical particles has been widely practiced in engineering processes, yet the understanding of multi-level mechanisms during solid transportation is still lacking. In this study, a high-fidelity super-ellipsoid Discrete Element Method (DEM) model is established to investigate the discharge behaviors of non-spherical particles with different size distributions. After the comprehensive model validations, we investigated the effects of particle shape (aspect ratio and particle sharpness) on the particle level discharge behaviors. The discharge rates of the ellipsoid particles used in the current work are larger than the spherical particles due to the larger solid fraction. The discharge rates of the cuboid-like particles are determined by the combined effect of the solid fraction and the contact force. Parcel level data show that the translational movements of the ellipsoid particles are more ordered, which is supported by the global level data. Strong correlations exist between the particle level and parcel level data, especially the ellipsoid particles and the large particles in the polydispersed cases.     

Dynamics and rheology of a dilute suspension of dipolar nonspherical particles in an external field: Part 1. Steady shear flows

Suspensions of small nonspherical particles having dipolar moments exhibit non-Newtonian behavior under the influence of shear and external fields. Numerical methods are presented for calculating the rheological and rheo-optical properties of dilute suspensions of Brownian particles having permanent dipoles subject to time-dependent shear and external fields. The numerical methods employ the Galerkin method of weighted residuals to solve the differential equation for the particle orientation distribution function. The steady-state shear flow intrinsic viscosity of suspensions of particles with sufficiently extreme aspect ratio is predicted to exhibit a maximum value attained for intermediate shear rates at selected field orientations. These numerical results provide valuable insight into the coupling which occurs between the effects of rotary Brownian motion, the hydrodynamic resistance of nonspherical particles, and the external torque exerted on dipolar particles. The results are applicable to both suspensions of magnetic particles and electrically dipolar particles.     

Hydrodynamic and thermal interactions of a cluster of solid particles in a pool of liquid of different Prandtl numbers using two-fluid model

The knowledge of thermal interaction between hot particles and liquid is essential for many engineering applications. The main focus of the present study is to understand the underlying phenomena of transient interaction between the hot particles and the liquid of varying Prandtl number under different parametric conditions. Analysis is carried out numerically using in-house multiphase code based on Eulerian two-fluid laminar model. The code is validated against existing results. The dispersion and penetration characteristics of the particles are observed to be a strong function of Prandtl number as well as volume fraction and particle diameter, with a stronger mushrooming observed for lower particle size or high Prandtl number liquid. The thermal interaction is observed to be between the particles and the narrow thermal envelope surrounding the particles. The particles cooling rate are observed to be several orders faster in a liquid with lower Prandtl number.     

Computation of wave interference and relaxation of particles after passing of a shock wave

Interaction of a shock wave with a system of motionless or relaxing particles is numerically simulated. Regimes of the gas flow around these particles are described, and the influence of the initial parameters of the examined phenomenon on the flow pattern is analyzed. The drag coefficient of particles is calculated as a function of the Mach number behind the shock wave at a fixed Reynolds number. The dynamics of heat exchange for particles of different sizes (10 μm–1 mm) is determined, and the laws of thermal relaxation after passing of a shock wave over the system of particles are found. The times of thermal and velocity relaxation of particles are estimated as functions of the Reynolds number, and the predicted relaxation time is compared with the corresponding empirical dependences.     

Effects of the mass and volume shrinkage of ground chip and pellet particles on drying rates

The effects of varying the mass and volume of ground chip and pellet particles on the particle drying rate were analyzed. Samples of whole pellets and chips were hammer milled using a 3.2 mm screen and the ground chip and pellet particles were found to have similar size distributions, although the pellet particles were denser and more spherical than the chip particles. Prior to drying, water was added to the particles to obtain 0.10, 0.30, 0.50, 0.70, and 0.90 moisture contents (on a dry mass basis). The moistened particles were subsequently dried in a constant temperature thin layer dryer set at 50, 100, 150, or 200 °C under dry pure nitrogen, dry compressed air, or atmospheric air. The chip and pellet particles exhibited similar degrees of shrinkage, but the pellet particles underwent a greater reduction in their bulk volume during drying. It appears that the more spherical pellet particles are prone to shrinkage in more than one direction, whereas the needle-like chip particle shrink only in one direction. A variable radius first order drying model was found to fit the experimental data better than a fixed radius model.     

空间模式下可压缩气固两相混合层流动特性研究

采用Euler-Lagrange颗粒-轨道双向耦合模型对空间模式下含有固粒的二维可压缩混合层流场进行了研究。气相流场采用具有空间三阶精度的WNND格式进行数值模拟,固相方程采用单边三点差分离散。在考虑流场对固粒作用的同时,也计及了固粒对流场的反作用。在对流马赫数为0.5时,研究了颗粒相对密度、颗粒尺寸、Stokes数等因素对粒子运动和流场结构的影响。研究结果表明:在可压缩空间模式混合层中,固粒的Stokes数仍然是主要影响参数之一;相同Stokes数下不同密度的固粒对流场的干扰不同,轻固粒对流场的干扰明显要小。     

Motion of a cloud of particles under gravity and its sedimentation on a flat horizontal surface

On the basis of the nonstationary two-dimensional equations of the mechanics of heterogeneous media a numerical investigation is made of the motion of a cloud of particles under the influence of gravity in an unbounded medium and the interaction of the descending cloud of particles with a flat horizontal surface. Depending on the degree of hydrodynamic interaction between the particles, there are different regimes of motion of the cloud during sedimentation; the change in its spatial configuration determined by the large-scale vortex motion of the carrier medium is determined. The concentration distributions of the particles on the sedimentation surface are obtained. A coefficient of dispersal is introduced for the cloud of particles on the flat horizontal surface, and its dependence on the concentration of the particles, their diameters, and other parameters is investigated.