Control of a sedimenting elliptical particle by electromagnetic forces

Abstract

In this paper, the effectiveness of electromagnetic forces on controlling the motion of a sedimenting elliptical particle is investigated using the immersed interface-lattice Boltzmann method (II-LBM) in which a signed distance function is adopted to apply the jump conditions for the II-LBM and to add external electromagnetic forces. First, mechanisms of electromagnetic control on suppressing vorticity generation based on the vorticity equation and vortex shedding based on the streamwise momentum equation are discussed. Then, systematic investigations are performed to quantify and qualify the effects of the electromagnetic control by changing the electromagnetic strength, the initial orientation angle of the elliptical particle, and the density ratio of the particle to the fluid. To demonstrate the control effect of different cases, comparisons of vorticity fields, particle trajectories, orientation angles, and energy transfers of the particles are presented. The results show that the rotational motion of the particle can be well controlled by appropriate magnitudes of electromagnetic forces. In a relatively high solid to fluid density ratio case where vortex shedding appears, the sedimentation speed can increase nearly 40% and the motion of the particle turns into a steady descending motion once an appropriate magnitude of the electromagnetic force is applied. When the magnitude of the electromagnetic force is excessive, the particle will deviate from the center of the side walls. In addition, the controlling approach is shown to be robust for various initial orientation angles and solid to fluid density ratios.