arXiv subjects

Yue Ling

Publications and source records attributed to Yue Ling.

26 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2023

Detailed numerical investigation of the drop aerobreakup in the bag breakup regime

Aerobreakup of drops is a fundamental two-phase flow problem that is essential to many spray applications. A parametric numerical study was performed by varying the gas stream velocity, focusing on the regime of moderate Weber numbers, in which the drop deforms to a forward bag. When the bag is unstable, it inflates and disintegrates into small droplets. Detailed numerical simulations were conducted using the volume-of-fluid method on an adaptive octree mesh to investigate the aerobreakup dynamics. Grid-refinement studies show that converged 3D simulation results for drop deformation and bag formation are achieved by the refinement level equivalent to 512 cells across the initial drop diameter. To resolve the thin liquid sheet when the bag inflates, the mesh is further refined to 2048 cells across the initial drop diameter. The simulation results for the drop length and radius were validated against previous experiments, and a good agreement was achieved. The high-resolution results of drop morphological evolution were used to identify the different phases in the aerobreakup process, characterize the distinct flow features and dominant mechanisms in each phase. In the early time, the drop deformation and velocity are independent of the Weber number, and a new internal-flow deformation model, which respects this asymptotic limit, has been developed. The pressure and velocity fields around the drop were shown to better understand the internal flow and interfacial instability that dictate the drop deformation. Finally, the impact of drop deformation on the drop dynamics was discussed.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2022

A consistent volume-of-fluid approach for direct numerical simulation of the aerodynamic breakup of a vaporizing drop

A novel simulation framework has been developed in this study for the direct numerical simulation of the aerodynamic breakup of a vaporizing drop. The interfacial multiphase flow with phase change is resolved using a consistent geometric volume-of-fluid method. The bulk fluids are viscous and incompressible with surface tension at the interface. The newly-developed numerical methods have been implemented in the Basilisk solver, in which the adaptive octree/quadtree mesh is used for spatial discretization, allowing flexibility in dynamically refining the mesh in a user-defined region. The simulation framework is extensively validated by a series of benchmark cases, including the 1D Stefan and sucking problems, the growth of a 3D spherical bubble in a superheated liquid, and a 2D film boiling problem. The simulation results agree very well with the exact solution and previous numerical studies. 2D axisymmetric simulations were performed to resolve the vaporization of a moving drop with a low Weber number in a high-temperature free stream. The computed rate of volume loss agrees well with the empirical model of drop evaporation. Finally, the validated solver is used to simulate the aerodynamic breakup of an acetone drop at a high Weber number. A fully 3D simulation is performed and the morphological evolution of the drop is accurately resolved. The rate of vaporization is found to be significantly enhanced due to the drop deformation and breakup. The drop volume decreases nonlinearly in time and at a much higher rate than the empirical correlation for a spherical drop.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2020

Natural oscillations of a sessile drop on flat surfaces with mobile contact lines

Oscillation of sessile drops is important to many applications. In the present study, the natural oscillation of a sessile drop on flat surfaces with free contact lines (FCL) is investigated through numerical and theoretical analysis. The FCL condition represents a limit of contact line mobility, i.e. the contact angle remains constant when the contact line moves. In the numerical simulation, the interfaces are captured by the volume-of-fluid method and the contact angle at the boundary is specified using the height-function method. The oscillation frequencies for sessile drops with FCL are mainly controlled by the contact angle and the Bond number and a parametric study is carried out to characterize their effects on the frequencies for the first and high-order modes. Particular attention is paid to the frequency of the first mode, since it is usually the dominant mode. An inviscid theoretical model for the first mode is developed. The model yields an explicit expression for the first-mode frequency as a function of the contact angle and the Bond number, with all parameters involved fully determined by the equilibrium drop theory and the simulation. The predicted frequencies for a wide range of contact angles agree very well with the simulation results for small Bond numbers. The frequencies for both the first and high-order modes decrease with the contact angle and increase with the Bond number. For the high-order modes, the frequencies for different modes generally scale with the Rayleigh frequencies. The scaling relation performs better for small Bond numbers and large contact angles. A simple model is proposed to predict the frequencies of high-order modes for large contact angles and a good agreement with the simulation results is observed.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2020

Modeling and Detailed Numerical Simulation of the Primary Breakup of a Gasoline Surrogate Jet under Non-Evaporative Operating Conditions

In the present study, detailed numerical simulations are performed to investigate the primary breakup of a gasoline surrogate jet under non-evaporative "Spray G" operating conditions. The Spray G injector and operating conditions, developed by the Engine Combustion Network (ECN), represent the early phase of spray-guided gasoline injection. To focus the computational resources on resolving the primary breakup, simplifications have been made on the injector geometry. The effect of the internal flow on the primary breakup is modeled by specifying a nonzero injection angle at the inlet. The nonzero injection angle results in an increase of the jet penetration speed and also a deflection of the liquid jet. A parametric study on the injection angle is performed, and the numerical results are compared to the experimental data to identify the injection angle that best represents the Spray G conditions. The nonzero injection angle introduces an azimuthally non-uniform velocity in the liquid jet, which in turn influences the instability development on the jet surfaces and also the deformation and breakup of the jet head. The asymmetric primary breakup dynamics eventually lead to an azimuthal variation of droplet size distributions. The number of droplets varies significantly with the azimuthal angle, but interestingly, the probability density functions (PDF) of droplet size for different azimuthal angles collapse to a self-similar profile. Analysis has also been conducted to estimate the percentage and statistics of the tiny droplets that are under resolved in the present simulation. The PDF of the azimuthal angle is also presented, which is also shown to exhibit a self-similar form that varies little over time. Finally, a model is developed to predict the droplet number as a function of droplet diameter, azimuthal angle where a droplet is located, and time.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2020

Short-term oscillation and falling dynamics for a water drop dripping in quiescent air

The short-term transient falling dynamics of a dripping water drop in quiescent air has been investigated through both simulation and experiment. The focus is on the short term behavior and the time range considered covers about eight dominant second-mode oscillations of the drop after it is formed. Due to the small fluid inertia the growth of the drop is quasi-static and is well captured by the static pendant drop theory. Nevertheless, the pinching dynamics and the resulting post-formation state of the drop trigger a nonlinear oscillation when the drop falls. The initial shape of the drop when it is just formed is decomposed into spherical harmonic modes. The pinching dynamics such as interface overturning introduces small-scale variation on the drop contour, which in turn contributes to the finite amplitudes of the higher-order modes. Furthermore, the initial kinetic energy when the droplet is just formed is as important as the initial surface energy contained in the drop shape, and is found to amplify the initial oscillation amplitude and to induce a phase shift in the oscillation of all the modes. By incorporating both the initial surface and kinetic energy, the linear model for a free drop oscillation yields very good predictions for the second and third modes. The mode amplitude spectra show both the primary frequencies that are consistent with the Lamb's theory and the secondary frequencies arising from different modes due to nonlinear inter-mode coupling. The complex transient flow inside and outside the drop is induced by the interaction between the falling motion and the nonlinear oscillation. The streamlines indicate that the internal flow is substantially different from the Hill vortex for a falling drop without oscillation. The temporal evolutions of both the internal flow and the wake morphology follow the dominant second oscillation mode.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2016

Spray formation: a numerical closeup

Spray formation and atomization in a gas-liquid mixing layer is an important fundamental problem of multiphase flows. It is highly desirable to visualize the detailed atomization process and to analyze the instabilities and mechanisms involved, and massive numerical simulations are required, in addition to experiment. Rapid development of numerical methods and computer technology in the past decades now allows large-scale three-dimensional direct numerical simulations of atomization to be performed. Nevertheless, the fundamental question, whether all the physical scales involved in the primary breakup process are faithfully resolved, remains unclear. In the present study, we conduct direct numerical simulations of spray formation in a gas-liquid mixing layer with state-of-the-art computational resources (using up to 4 billion cells and 16384 cores), in order to obtain a high-fidelity numerical closeup of the detailed mechanisms of spray formation. We also aim to examine whether present computational resources are sufficient for a fully resolved direct numerical simulation of atomization.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2016

Droplet migration in a Hele-Shaw cell: Effect of the lubrication film on the droplet dynamics

Droplet migration in a Hele--Shaw cell is a fundamental multiphase flow problem which is crucial for many microfluidics applications. We focus on the regime at low capillary number and three-dimensional direct numerical simulations are performed to investigate the problem. In order to reduce the computational cost, an adaptive mesh is employed and high mesh resolution is only used near the interface. Parametric studies are performed on the droplet horizontal radius and the capillary number. For droplets with an horizontal radius larger than half the channel height the droplet overfills the channel and exhibits a pancake shape. A lubrication film is formed between the droplet and the wall and particular attention is paid to the effect of the lubrication film on the droplet velocity. The computed velocity of the pancake droplet is shown to be lower than the average inflow velocity, which is in agreement with experimental measurements. The numerical results show that both the strong shear induced by the lubrication film and the three-dimensional flow structure contribute to the low mobility of the droplet. In this low-migration-velocity scenario the interfacial flow in the droplet reference frame moves toward the rear on the top and reverses direction moving to the front from the two side edges. The velocity of the pancake droplet and the thickness of the lubrication film are observed to decrease with capillary number. The droplet velocity and its dependence on capillary number cannot be captured by the classic Hele--Shaw equations, since the depth-averaged approximation neglects the effect of the lubrication film.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2015

Droplet in micro-channels: A numerical approach using an adaptive two phase flow solver

We propose a numerical approach to study the mechanics of a flowing bubble in a constraint micro channel. Using an open source two phase flow solver (Gerris, gfs.sourceforge.net) we compute solutions of the bubble dynamics (i.e. shape and terminal velocity) induced by the interaction between the bubble movement, the Laplace pressure variation, and the lubrication film near the channel wall. Quantitative and qualitative results are presented and compared against both theory and experimental data for small Capillary numbers. We discuss the technical issues of explicit integration methods on small Capillary numbers computations, and the possibility of adding Van der Walls forces to give a more precise picture of the Droplet-based microfluidic problem.

physics.flu-dyn↗