Investigation of elastic light scattering in flame spray pyrolysis modelled by a stochastic particle approach

Abstract

The synthesis of iron(III) oxide particulates from iron pentacarbonyl (IPC) in a flame spray pyrolysis process is predicted by a multiple mapping conditioning (MMC) method. MMC is coupled with carrier-phase large eddy simulations and a sectional description of the population balance equation. MMC is a sparse particle method, where the number of stochastic particles is heavily reduced in comparison to conventional particle methods. The associated computational savings allow for the use of a detailed chemical mechanism for gas phase reactions, particulate precursor formation and an accurate description of the particulate size distribution. The numerical configuration is based on the SpraySyn burner which is a laboratory-scale burner for the synthesis of nano-particulates from liquid precursor solutions. The IPC concentration is varied from 0.2 mol/l to 0.8 mol/l IPC in ethanol to provide a series of validation experiments for the model’s prediction of particulate formation and growth. Parameter studies reveal that standard assumptions with respect to the morphology unduly affect the model’s prediction and that variation within sensible boundaries can significantly improve agreement with measurements and has large effects on the predicted particulate size distribution of the product species.