Mesoscale flow structures turbulence

Many industrial processes are stiU designed on the basis of the assumptions of plug flow and steady-state uniform two-phase flow. For this chapter, much evidence has been collected with respect to the abundant occurrence of transient mesoscale coherent structures, strands, or clusters in various turbulent multiphase flows, at least at scales and under conditions relevant to industrial processes. This evidence is from a variety of sources experimental observations in academic laboratories, results from hydrodynamic stability analyses, and computational simulation studies (both of the LES and the DNS type). Unfortunately, this evidence comprises many indecisive and even contradictory reports about the drivers behind these structures, clusters, and strands, and about their dependence on density ratio, particle size, volume fractions, operating conditions, and so on. 

It is the author s conviction that in many (turbulent) dispersed multiphase flows—except probably in very dense multiphase flow systems—the origin of mesoscale structures is in the fluid—particle interaction, with a secondary role for particle-particle interaction (coUisions, coalescence, breakup). Clustering of particles is believed to be intimately connected with the chaotic dynamics of fluid accelerations, as particles converge toward each other where and when the divergence of the acceleration field is positive (Goto... 

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