Pseudo-Eulerian model formulation for the determination of breakage frequency and daughter size distribution: Single droplet breakup experiments in turbulent flow

Abstract

The study of breakage of single oil droplet in a turbulent flow is experimentally performed by means of direct visualization using high-speed imaging. A comparison of two different approaches for estimation of the breakage frequency is presented using the same set of experimental data. The first approach, estimates the breakage frequency based on the estimation of the averaged breakage time and breakage probability calculation based on single oil breakage experiments. The second approach consists in combining and superposing the different measurements into one population of droplets, to investigate the evolution of the size distribution of droplets emulating a pseudo-Eulerian representation. Using this approach, the breakage frequency can be estimated by following the evolution of the number of droplets of a particular size. We found that the pseudo-Eulerian approach is more accurate for construction of closure model for the implementation of population balance equation.