Modulation of homogeneous and isotropic turbulence in emulsions

Abstract

We present a numerical study of emulsions in homogeneous and isotropic turbulence at $R{e}_{\lambda }=137$. The problem is addressed via Direct Numerical Simulations (DNS), where the Volume of Fluid (VOF) is used to represent the complex features of the liquid-liquid interface. We consider a mixture of two iso-density fluids, where fluid properties are varied with the goal of understanding their role in turbulence modulation, in particular the volume fraction ($0.03<\alpha <0.5$), viscosity ratio ($0.01<{\mu }_d/{\mu }_c<100$) and large scale Weber number ($10.6<W{e}_{\mathcal{L}}<106.5$). The analysis, performed by studying integral quantities and spectral scale-by-scale analysis, reveals that energy is consistently transported from large to small scales by the interface, and no inverse cascade is observed. Furthermore, the total surface is found to be directly proportional to the amount of energy transported, while viscosity and surface tension alter the dynamic that regulates energy transport. We also observe the $-10/3$ and $-3/2$ scaling on droplet size distributions, suggesting that the dimensional arguments which led to their derivation are verified in HIT conditions.

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Cited by in corpus (10)

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• FluTAS: A GPU-accelerated finite difference code for multiphase flows
• Morphology of clean and surfactant-laden droplets in homogeneous isotropic turbulence
• Recent developments of turbulent emulsions in Taylor-Couette flow
• Turbulence drag modulation by dispersed droplets in Taylor-Couette flow: the effects of the dispersed phase viscosity
• Numerical investigation of the segregation of turbulent emulsions
• Scale-by-scale kinetic energy budgets in multiphase turbulence
• Intermittency of bubble deformation in turbulence
• Scale-by-scale energy transfers in bubbly flows
• Conversions between kinetic and surface energy in periodically forced multiphase turbulence