Award Abstract # 1150389
CAREER: Microflow of highly viscous fluids: mixing and dissolution processes

NSF Org: CBET
Division of Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental, and Transport Systems
Recipient: THE RESEARCH FOUNDATION FOR THE STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK
Initial Amendment Date: February 10, 2012
Latest Amendment Date: June 14, 2017
Award Number: 1150389
Award Instrument: Continuing Grant
Program Manager: Ron Joslin
rjoslin@nsf.gov
 (703)292-7030
CBET
 Division of Chemical, Bioengineering, Environmental, and Transport Systems
ENG
 Directorate for Engineering
Start Date: June 1, 2012
End Date: May 31, 2018 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount: $400,000.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date: $441,649.00
Funds Obligated to Date: FY 2012 = $117,558.00
FY 2013 = $69,150.00

FY 2014 = $70,745.00

FY 2015 = $72,389.00

FY 2016 = $71,811.00

FY 2017 = $39,996.00
History of Investigator:
  • Thomas Cubaud (Principal Investigator)
    thomas.cubaud@stonybrook.edu
Recipient Sponsored Research Office: SUNY at Stony Brook
W5510 FRANKS MELVILLE MEMORIAL LIBRARY
STONY BROOK
NY  US  11794-0001
(631)632-9949
Sponsor Congressional District: 01
Primary Place of Performance: SUNY at Stony Brook
WEST 5510 FRK MEL LIB
STONY BROOK
NY  US  11794-3366
Primary Place of Performance
Congressional District:
01
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): M746VC6XMNH9
Parent UEI: M746VC6XMNH9
NSF Program(s): FD-Fluid Dynamics
Primary Program Source: 01001213DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
01001314DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01001415DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01001516DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01001617DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT

01001718DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s): 059E, 1045
Program Element Code(s): 144300
Award Agency Code: 4900
Fund Agency Code: 4900
Assistance Listing Number(s): 47.041

ABSTRACT

1150389
Cubaud

High-viscosity fluids represent a broad class of materials that are essential to many aspects of energy technologies and life. We know from everyday observation that viscous fluids are sticky and thick. They tend to attach to surfaces and they form filamentous structures when manipulated. Their large viscosity coefficient makes them slow and difficult to displace, and blending them with other materials requires a long time. Today, the limited supplies of fossil energy resources require the development of innovative methods for finely handling viscous materials and gaseous byproducts over multiple length scales. This project combines educational and research activities designed to expand the scientific foundations for new and improved manipulations of highly viscous fluids at the small scale. Novel strategies will be deployed to rapidly mix and enrich thick materials using high-pressure microfluidic devices. Two research thrusts are proposed. The first involves blending low- and high-viscosity miscible fluids in continuous flow configurations. The formation of viscous stratifications and the stability of lubricated threads against diffusion, inertia, and viscous buckling phenomena will be experimentally and numerically modeled in confined microgeometries. The second investigation focuses on microscale dissolution processes of carbon dioxide with viscous fluids. Segmented microflows of dissolving gas bubbles will be examined for impregnating viscous substances and unlocking the fundamentals of carbon sequestration in porous-like media. This work will lead to the development of predictive models and improve our understanding and practical use of liquid/liquid and liquid/gas multiphase flows in the presence of diffusive interfaces at the small scale.

Intellectual merit: This project will provide a comprehensive and unifying picture of the flow behavior of viscous fluids with miscible lubricants. A series of carefully designed experiments, theoretical arguments, and numerical modeling will generate a reliable and systematic knowledge concerning the emerging properties of high-viscosity microflows and viscous buckling instabilities. Carbonated multiphase flows will be characterized at the pore level over a wide range of fluid properties and operating parameters. This work will expand the frontier of understanding in fluid dynamics and open up a new era of fluid processing capabilities.

Broader impacts: This program will offer substantial educational opportunities for a diversity of students, including underrepresented, high school, undergraduate, and graduate students. The PI will dedicate his efforts to educate and train students to cutting edge research in fluid science. Results developed during this project will be incorporated into the PI's outreach and teaching activities at every level. This work will help improve continuous flow-based mixing apparatuses for high-viscosity fluids and offer new expertise for the microflow management of petrochemical products and viscous biomaterials, the recycling of used oils, and the capture of carbon-based byproducts.

PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH

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(Showing: 1 - 10 of 13)
Bibin M. Jose and Thomas Cubaud "Formation and dynamics of partially wetting droplets in square microchannels" RSC Advances , v.4 , 2014 , p.14962 10.1039/C4RA00654B
Bibin M. JoseThomas Cubaud "Role of viscosity coefficients during spreading and coalescence of droplets in liquids" Physical Review Fluids , v.2 , 2017 , p.111601(R) https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevFluids.2.111601
Cubaud, Thomas "Segmented flows of viscous threads in microchannels" Physical Review Fluids , v.4 , 2019 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevFluids.4.084201 Citation Details
Cubaud, Thomas "Swelling of Diffusive Fluid Threads in Microchannels" Physical Review Letters , v.125 , 2020 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.125.174502 Citation Details
Cubaud, Thomas and Conry, Bryan and Hu, Xiaoyi and Dinh, Thai "Diffusive and capillary instabilities of viscous fluid threads in microchannels" Physical Review Fluids , v.6 , 2021 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevFluids.6.094202 Citation Details
Hu, Xiaoyi and Cubaud, Thomas "From droplets to waves: periodic instability patterns in highly viscous microfluidic flows" Journal of Fluid Mechanics , v.887 , 2020 https://doi.org/10.1017/jfm.2019.1009 Citation Details
Martin Sauzade and Thomas Cubaud "Bubbles in complex microgeometries at large capillary numbers" Physics of Fluids , v.26 , 2014 , p.091109 http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4893544
Martin Sauzade and Thomas Cubaud "Initial microfluidic dissolution regime of CO_2 bubbles in viscous oils" Physical Review E , v.88 , 2013 , p.051001(r) http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.88.051001
Martin SauzadeThomas Cubaud "Bubble deformations and segmented flows in corrugated microchannels at large capillary numbers" Physical Review Fluids , v.3 , 2018 , p.034202 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevFluids.3.034202
Thomas Cubaud and Sara Notaro "Regimes of miscible fluid thread formation in microfluidic focusing sections" Physics of Fluids , v.26 , 2014 , p.122005 http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4903534
Thomas Cubaud, Diane Henderson, and Xiaoyi Hu "Separation of highly viscous fluid threads in branching microchannels" Microfluidics and Nanofluidics , v.20 , 2016 , p.55 10.1007/s10404-016-1720-7
(Showing: 1 - 10 of 13)

PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT

Disclaimer

This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.

This program has provided fundamental advances in our understanding of the flow behavior of highly viscous fluids at the small scale. High-viscosity fluids represent a broad class of materials that are essential to many aspects of life and human activity. The limited ability to precisely manipulate thick substances, however, has prevented the development of innovative methods for the microflow management of petrochemical products and viscous biomaterials, as well as the recycling of used oils and multiphase compounds using miniaturized systems.This project addressed this shortcoming with an integrated suite of educational and research activities designed to expand the scientific foundations for new and improved manipulations of highly viscous fluids. Two research thrusts were examined to develop a set of novel techniques for the blending of low- and high-viscosity fluids using continuous injections. The first involved the mixing of separated fluids using hydrodynamics instabilities in microchannels and the second focused on microscale dissolution of dispersed bubbles to better manipulate impregnation processes of thick fluids with carbon dioxide in porous media.

As viscous fluids are known to attach to surfaces and form filamentous structures, a useful technique for manipulating thick materials is the use of thin, low-viscosity fluids to form well-controlled stratifications and lubricated threads in small conduits. During the course of this work, the PI and his group uncovered and characterized a range of novel small-scale destabilization processes of viscous layered flows and filaments that facilitate the mixing and emulsification of thick fluids. In particular, the combined roles of fluid properties, flow parameters, and confining geometries were clarified for the formation of stable and unstable flow patterns, including various breaking modes of interfacial waves as well as diffusive and buckling instabilities of slender viscous structures. New predictive capabilities were developed for the mixing and separation of widely disparate fluids in microsystems. 

Another fundamental aspect of this work consisted in the characterization of gas dissolution phenomena with thick fluids to better control carbonated microflows. Dissolving bubbles flowing with high-viscosity fluids adopt complex behaviors depending on parameters such as individual diffusion rate and collective bubble arrangements. The PI and his group took advantage of microfluidic platforms to examine enhanced gas transfer in a variety of solvents and better delineate dissolving microflows with highly-viscous fluids. Basic advances in separated and dispersed microflows were also complemented with the characterization of the spreading and coalescence dynamics of droplets immersed in viscous fluids to elucidate the combined role of inner and outer viscosities on spontaneous capillary phenomena.  

This project provided a well-structured research environment for the training of three doctoral students and a variety of undergraduate students of diverse backgrounds. The development of a unifying framework for the microscale manipulation of thick fluids lead to numerous publications and the creation of teaching resources for illustrating some of the basic properties of viscous flows, capillary phenomena, and hydrodynamic instabilities. Explanatory videos designed for scientific dissemination are available on public-sharing websites for outreach to the public. This project provided significant improvement in fundamental and practical knowledge for the control of high-viscosity fluids. The possibility to mix, separate, and enrich viscous matter in miniaturized systems lays the scientific foundations of future fluid processing technology and this work is expected to make a long-term impact on society given the widespread of viscous materials in nature and in the industry.

 


Last Modified: 09/26/2018
Modified by: Thomas Cubaud

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