Numerical Analysis of Natural Convection of Suspension With Particle Sedimentation

Abstract

A new method for the numerical analysis of natural convection of suspension was proposed. Natural convection phenomena of suspension appear in some industrial fields, such as water disposal process and food engineering process. It is difficult to comprehend the behavior of the natural convection of the suspensions, because the convection of the suspension is caused by the interactive effects of the temperature distribution and particle-concentration distribution in the suspension. In this study, a numerical model for the natural convection phenomena of the suspension accompanied by particle sedimentation was constructed. In this model, since the limited number of particles is tracked individually, the movement of each particle which has varied sizes can be achieved. Then the effect of distribution of particle size on the particle-concentration in the suspension can be considered. As a result, it was confirmed that the typical behavior of the natural convection of suspension can be expressed by using this model. Additionally, it was found that the mean Nusselt number of the natural convection of the suspension obtained by using this model shows the same tendency as that of the previous experiments.