NDLI: Numerical Simulation of Mass Transfer Characteristics in a Taylor Flow Microreactor

Content Provider	The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Digital Collection
Author	Ganapathy, Harish Al-Hajri, Ebrahim Michael, M. Ohadi
Copyright Year	2011
Abstract	The aim of this work is to investigate numerically the mass transfer characteristics in a Taylor flow microchannel reactor. Previous attempts to model gas-liquid mass transfer in microchannels have mainly been done by the unit cell based models. Limitations of this approach are its incapability to account for the mass transfer in the inlet mixing region and the dependence on empirical data to define the unit cell geometry. The present work attempts to overcome both these shortcomings by adopting a purely numerical approach to model the mass transfer in a Taylor flow microreactor. A finite-element implementation of the phase field method was used to predict the hydrodynamics of the two-phase flow The flow pattern obtained was used to define the computational domain to model the mass transfer. The reaction system of CO2 absorption into aqueous NaOH solution was considered for gas superficial velocities ranging from 0.09 to 0.25 m/s with the liquid phase superficial velocities ranging from 0.02 to 0.21 m/s. Channels with hydraulic diameters ranging from 100 μm to 500 μm were considered with flow focusing and cross flow types of inlet configuration. The effect of channel length was also studied by varying the residence time in the transient simulation. Results suggest that the conventional unit cell based approaches which do not model the inlet mixing region could over predict the mass transfer by up to 16%. Smaller diameter channels were found to have improved mass transfer characteristics. This was found to be further enhanced by higher concentration levels of the liquid reactant and higher temperatures. The channel wall wettability was found to negligibly affect the mass transfer characteristics. The predictions from the present model were compared with experimental data as well as with predictions of the unit cell based model and a good agreement was obtained with both models.
Sponsorship	Heat Transfer Division
Starting Page	685
Ending Page	695
Page Count	11
File Format	PDF
ISBN	9780791844632
DOI	10.1115/ICNMM2011-58155
Volume Number	ASME 2011 9th International Conference on Nanochannels, Microchannels, and Minichannels, Volume 1
Conference Proceedings	ASME 2011 9th International Conference on Nanochannels, Microchannels, and Minichannels
Language	English
Publisher Date	2011-06-19
Publisher Place	Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Access Restriction	Subscribed
Subject Keyword	Inlet mixing Microreactor Unit cell Microchannel Mass transfer Taylor flow Computer simulation Flow (dynamics) Microchannels
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article

Sl.	Authority	Responsibilities	Communication Details
1	Ministry of Education (GoI), Department of Higher Education	Sanctioning Authority	https://www.education.gov.in/ict-initiatives
2	Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	Host Institute of the Project: The host institute of the project is responsible for providing infrastructure support and hosting the project	https://www.iitkgp.ac.in
3	National Digital Library of India Office, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur	The administrative and infrastructural headquarters of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in
4	Project PI / Joint PI	Principal Investigator and Joint Principal Investigators of the project	Dr. B. Sutradhar bsutra@ndl.gov.in Prof. Saswat Chakrabarti will be added soon
5	Website/Portal (Helpdesk)	Queries regarding NDLI and its services	support@ndl.gov.in
6	Contents and Copyright Issues	Queries related to content curation and copyright issues	content@ndl.gov.in
7	National Digital Library of India Club (NDLI Club)	Queries related to NDLI Club formation, support, user awareness program, seminar/symposium, collaboration, social media, promotion, and outreach	clubsupport@ndl.gov.in
8	Digital Preservation Centre (DPC)	Assistance with digitizing and archiving copyright-free printed books	dpc@ndl.gov.in
9	IDR Setup or Support	Queries related to establishment and support of Institutional Digital Repository (IDR) and IDR workshops	idr@ndl.gov.in