Numerical investigation of the bubble growth in horizontal rectangular microchannels |
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| Authors: | Yang Luo Jingzhi Zhang Ekaterina Sokolova Yourong Li W J Minkowycz |
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| Affiliation: | 1. Department of Energy Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China;2. Department of Energy Engineering, Co-Innovation Center for Advanced Aero-Engine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China;3. School of Energy and Power Engineering, Shandong University, Jinan, Shandong, China;4. Department of Nuclear and Heat Power Engineering, Peter the Great Saint Petersburg Polytechnic University, Saint Petersburg, Russia;5. Key Laboratory of Low-Grade Energy Utilization Technologies and Systems of Ministry of Education, College of Power Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing, Chongqing, China;6. Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering (M/C 251), University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA |
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| Abstract: | To explore the mechanism of flow boiling in microchannels, the processes of a single-vapor bubble evaporating and two lateral bubbles merging in a 2D microchannel are investigated. The temperature recovery model based on volume of fluid method is adopted to perform the flow boiling phenomena. The effects of wall superheat, Reynolds number, contact angle, surface tension, and two-bubble merger on heat transfer are discussed. Wall superheat dominates the bubble growth and is roughly proportional to wall heat flux. The update of velocity and temperature fields’ distribution in the channel increases with increasing inflow Reynolds number, which improves the wall heat flux markedly. Besides, the area of thin liquid film between the wall and the bubble is enlarged by reducing the contact angle, thus, expanding the wall heat flux several times compared with the single-phase cross section. However, variation of surface tension (0.0589, 0.1?N/m) is found to be insignificant. |
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