Mass transfer from a sheared spherical rigid capsule

Abstract

Solute mass transfer from a spherical fluid-filled rigid capsule subjected to shear flow is studied numerically, while considering unsteady, continuous, and nonuniform boundary conditions on its surface. Here, the capsule acts as a reservoir with its initially encapsulated solute concentration decaying over time. This scenario differs from the classical case study of either constant concentration or constant mass flux at the surface of the particle. The flow and the concentration field are computed using fully three-dimensional lattice Boltzmann simulations, where the fluid-structure two-way coupling is achieved by the immersed boundary method. The effects of the flow and the boundary conditions on mass transfer efficacy are quantified by the Sherwood number (the dimensionless mass transfer coefficient), which is found to increase due to the combined effects of forced convection and the rotation of the capsule. Having continuity of both the concentration and the mass flux on the capsule significantly decreases the Sherwood number as compared to the case with constant and uniform boundary condition. All the obtained results can be applied to heat transfer in the case of cooling an initially hot spherical particle, for which the concentration must be replaced by the temperature and the Sherwood number by the Nusselt number.