Simulation of a single bubble rising with hybrid particle-mesh method

Abstract

A computational study of the dynamics on a gas bubble rising in a viscous liquid by a hybrid particle-mesh method is presented. The hybrid particle-mesh method has been developed for the simulation of a two-phase flow. One phase is represented by moving particles and the other phase is defined on a stationary mesh. The flow field is discretized by conservative finite volume approximation on the stationary mesh, and the interface is automatically captured by the distribution of particles moving through the stationary mesh. The moving particles are calculated by Moving Particle Semi-implicit (MPS) method. The effect of surface tension is evaluated by the continuum surface force model. In this study, we simulate the motion of a gas bubble rising in a viscous liquid. The buoyancy driven motion of the bubble in a wide range of flow regimes is simulated successfully by the present method. The deforming interface of the bubble is captured effectively by the moving particles although significant density and viscosity differences exist. By comparing the simulation results with experimental ones, we approve the possibility of applying the hybrid method to the two-phase flow with particles representing the gas phase and mesh representing the liquid phase. © 2007 Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.