A simple bimodal model for the evolution of non-spherical particles undergoing nucleation, coagulation and coalescence

Abstract

A simple and efficient particle dynamics model is developed accounting for simultaneous nucleation, coagulation, and coalescence or sintering of non-spherical particles. In this model two discrete monodisperse modes are used to represent the non-spherical particle size distributions approximately: a size-fixed nucleation mode and a moving accumulation mode. The size-fixed nucleation mode accounts for the introduction of newly generated particles and the moving accumulation mode characterizes the particle growth by coagulation and coalescence. The simulation results for titania particle formation and growth using the proposed bimodal model are compared with those using the previous monodisperse non-spherical particle dynamics model and non-spherical polydisperse sectional model. The present bimodal model results in a very good agreement with the polydiserse sectional model even when particle nucleation coexists with coagulation process while the monodisperse model shows significant differences. It successfully predicts the morphological change of the non-spherical particles by coalescence. The present model is also shown to be capable of predicting the polydispersity of non-spherical particle distribution. The present non-spherical bimodal model requires the same level of the computation time that the simple monodisperse model does.