Physics of Fluids - Publications

Growth of a bubble cloud in CO2-saturated water under microgravity

arΧiv
Soft Matter 16, 4728–4738 (2020)
See also: Cover of that volume

Authors

	Patricia Vega-Martínez
	Javier Rodríguez Rodríguez
	Devaraj van der Meer

BibTeΧ

@Article{D0SM00015A,
author ="Vega-Martínez, Patricia and Rodríguez-Rodríguez, Javier and van der Meer, Devaraj",
title  ="Growth of a bubble cloud in CO2-saturated water under microgravity",
journal  ="Soft Matter",
year  ="2020",
volume  ="16",
issue  ="20",
pages  ="4728-4738",
publisher  ="The Royal Society of Chemistry",
doi  ="10.1039/D0SM00015A",
url  ="http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/D0SM00015A",
abstract  ="The diffusion-driven growth of a dense cloud of bubbles immersed in a gas-supersaturated liquid is a problem that finds applications in several modern technologies such as solvent-exchange micro-reactors{,} nanotechnology or the manufacturing of foamy materials. However{,} under Earth{'}s gravity conditions{,} these dynamics can only be observed for a very limited time if the cloud is not attached to a surface{,} due to the action of buoyancy{,} i.e. of gravity effects. Here{,} we present experimental observations of the time evolution of dense bubble clouds growing in CO2-supersaturated water under microgravity conditions. We report the existence of three regimes where the bubble cloud exhibits different growth rates. At short times{,} each bubble grows independently following the Epstein–Plesset equation. Later on{,} bubbles start to interact with each other and their growth rate diminishes as they compete for the available CO2. When this happens{,} the growth rate slows down. This occurs earlier the deeper the bubble is in the cloud. Finally{,} at long times{,} only those bubbles on the husk continue growing. These regimes may be qualitatively described by a mathematical model where each individual bubble grows in the presence of a constellation of point mass sinks. Despite the model being only valid for dilute bubble clouds{,} its predictions are consistent with the experimental observations{,} even though the bubble clouds we observe are rather dense."}