Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176

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Chemical Engineering Science

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ces

Effects of inlet condition on flow structure of bubbly flow

in a rectangular column
Mohd. Hatta bin Mohd. Akbar a, Kosuke Hayashi a, Dirk Lucas b, Akio Tomiyama a,n
a
Graduate School of Engineering, Kobe University, Rokkodai, Nada, Kobe 657-8501, Japan
b
Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Germany

H I G H L I G H T S

Effects of inlet condition on flow structure in a bubble column are investigated.

Bubbly flow is apt to be heterogeneous even with small non-uniformity in gas inflow.

Lift force plays an important role in formation of heterogeneous structure.

Effects of inlet condition on flow structure are predictable with multi-fluid models.

art ic l e i nf o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Experiments on bubbly flows in a rectangular column are carried out to investigate effects of inlet
Received 15 June 2013 condition on flow structure. An air diffuser having 35 nozzles is used. The inlet gas flow rates from 34
Received in revised form nozzles are uniform and the lift coefficients of bubbles are small at this flow rate, whereas the gas inflow
29 August 2013
from the remaining one nozzle is varied to change the sign and magnitude of lift coefficients. The main
Accepted 5 September 2013
conclusions obtained are as follows: (1) bubbly flow in a bubble column is apt to be heterogeneous even
Available online 13 September 2013
with small non-uniformity in the distribution of gas inflow; (2) when the nozzle causing non-uniform
Keywords: gas inflow is located in the center of the diffuser plate and the inflow distribution is symmetric,
Instability heterogeneous structure is formed mainly due to the lift-induced flow instability pointed out by Lucas
Bubble
et al. (2005); (3) when the nozzle causing non-uniform gas inflow is located near the side wall of the
Bubble column
column and the inflow distribution is asymmetric, heterogeneous structure is induced by the Coanda
Inlet condition
Lift force effect; and (4) a multi-fluid model has a potential of predicting the effects of inlet condition on flow
Multi-fluid model structure in a bubble column.
& 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Bubbly flow can be homogeneous at a low gas volumetric flux,

Bubbly flow is widely encountered in practical systems such as
bubble column chemical reactors and bioreactors. The flow struc-
ture of bubbly flow in a bubble column has been classified into
homogeneous and heterogeneous regimes. The bubble size and
the distribution of void fraction in the former are almost uniform,
resulting in no large-scale vortical structure. In the latter, there are
bubbles of various sizes and vortical structure is formed due to the
rising motion of large bubbles. Since the spatial distributions of
gas and liquid velocities and void fraction strongly depend on the
flow structure, knowledge on the relation between the operating
condition of a bubble column and the flow structure is of great
importance.
n
Corresponding author. Tel./fax: þ 81 78 803 6131.
E-mail address: tomiyama@mech.kobe-u.ac.jp (A. Tomiyama).
whereas the flow is apt to be heterogeneous at a high gas
volumetric flux. On the contrary, Harteveld et al. (2003),
Harteveld (2005) carried out experiments on bubbly flows of high
volumetric fluxes in a cylindrical bubble column by using a
carefully-controlled sparger system and proved that homogeneous
structure can be formed even at very high void fractions up to 50%,
provided that the inlet gas flow rate and bubble size from each
nozzle are uniform.
They also investigated effects of inlet conditions on flow
structure in a pseudo two-dimensional bubble column, which
has 95 nozzles divided into 7 groups under control, by making a
non-aerated nozzle group (Harteveld et al., 2004; Harteveld, 2005;
Darmana et al., 2009). They demonstrated that no large-scale
vortical structure was formed when small non-aerated regions
were in the center region of the inlet area, whereas large-scale
vortical structure was formed in the bottom region of the column
when the non-aerated region was located near the side walls.

0009-2509/$ - see front matter & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ces.2013.09.019
 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176 167

Julia et al. (2007) also investigated effects of inlet condition on

bubbly flow structure using a pseudo two-dimensional bubble
column and an inlet system similar to those in Harteveld et al.
(2003), Harteveld (2005) and Darmana et al. (2009). Non-aerated
regions were introduced near the side walls. Vortical structure was
formed near the inlet region as the non-aerated region expanded.
The vortical structure was almost static if the non-aerated region
was not large, whereas the vortices grew in the upward direction
and the bubble plume between them oscillated when the non-
aerated region became large. They pointed out that the side walls
played an important role in the oscillating motion of the plume
when the non-aerated region was small, whereas the wall effect
on the oscillating motion became weaker as the non-aerated
region increased.
Lucas et al. (2005) theoretically investigated influence of the lift
force on the stability of bubbly flows. They pointed out that in the
presence of a non-uniform liquid velocity field the lift force acting
on small bubbles transfers bubbles to a lower velocity side and
stabilizes the flow, whereas the lift force acting on large bubbles
transfers bubbles to a higher velocity region (Tomiyama et al.,
2002) and the accumulation of bubbles in this region makes the
liquid upward motion faster, which results in heterogeneous flow
structure. According to this mechanism of the onset of flow
instability, it is expected that flow structure is strongly affected
by slight non-uniformity in inlet conditions. However, experimen-
tal validation of this mechanism has not been carried out yet.
In this study, effects of non-uniformity in inlet condition on the
flow structure of bubbly flows in a rectangular column having 35
nozzles were therefore investigated experimentally. A sparger
system, which can realize either a uniform inflow or a small
disturbance on the uniform inflow, was made for this purpose.
A reference gas flow rate was determined to generate bubbles with
lift coefficients close to zero, by which homogeneous structure was
formed. The bubble size at only one nozzle was then varied to
change the sign of the lift coefficient to either positive or negative
by adjusting the gas flow rate from that nozzle. Numerical
simulation of the bubbly flow was also carried out using a multi-
fluid model to examine whether or not it can reproduce the effect
of small disturbance in the inlet condition.

2. Experimental setup and methods

The experimental setup is shown in Fig. 1(a). The column was
made of transparent acrylic resin, and its width, depth and height
were 240, 72 and 800 mm, respectively. Tap water and air at
atmospheric pressure and room temperature were used for the
liquid and gas phases, respectively. The initial water level was
700 mm. The air flowed into the column through the bubble
diffuser plate attached to the column bottom. The diffuser plate
had 35 stainless nozzles, whose lengths and inner diameters were
160 and 0.51 mm, respectively. Two gas supply lines, A and B, were
installed; one was used for supplying air to 34 nozzles and the
other was for the remaining nozzle. For the former, most of the air
supplied from the compressor (Hitachi Oilfree Scroll 2.2, SRL-
2.2DA6) flowed into the air chamber through the critical nozzle,
the regulator (Nihon-seiki, BN-3RT5, 0–1.0 MPa) and the mass
flow controller (Kofloc, Model 3660, 1.5% full-scale accuracy). Due
to the large pressure drop over the nozzles, fluctuations of air
pressure were strongly suppressed, and as result a uniform air
injection was realized (Garnier et al., 2002). A part of the air from
the compressor was separated and flowed to the latter nozzle
through the mass flow controller (Kofloc, Model 8500, 1.5% full-
scale accuracy).
Two configurations of the nozzles shown in Fig. 1(b) and
(c) were used. The nozzle of line B was located at the center of
Fig. 1. (a) Experimental setup, (b) Bubble diffuser plate (case Sy) and (c) Bubble
diffuser plate (case As).
the diffuser plate in the former so that the nozzle configuration
was symmetric. On the other hand, the configuration was asym-
metric in the latter, in which the nozzle of line B was located near
a side wall. Hereafter the former and latter configurations are
referred to as Case Sy (symmetric) and Case As (asymmetric),
respectively.
The gas flow rate from each nozzle of line A and that of line B
are denoted as QA and QB, respectively. QA was set so as to generate
bubbles of lift coefficient, CL, close to zero. Since the lift coefficient
of a bubble depends on its diameter (Tomiyama et al., 2002), the
bubble diameter was measured at various gas flow rates from a
single nozzle. Successive 8-bit grayscale images of bubbles were
taken near the outlet of the nozzles by using the high-speed video
camera to evaluate the sphere-volume equivalent bubble dia-
meter, dB. Images of individual bubbles were randomly selected,
and their circumferential lengths and projected areas were mea-
sured using a digitizing area-line meter (Tamaya Super Planix, β).
The bubble diameter was calculated from the circumference and
area (Maekawa et al., 2006). Maekawa et al. (2006) measured
bubbles, whose dB ranged from 2.2 to 3.4 mm, using the same
method. The number of bubbles processed was 100 and the
168 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176

Fig. 2. Size distributions of bubbles from a single nozzle.

Table 1
Mean bubble diameter and lift coefficient evaluated using lift correlation
(Tomiyama et al., 2002).

Q  10  6 [m3/s] 0.9 1.5 3.0 5.0 6.7 8.3

dB [mm] 3.9 4.4 5.4 6.2 6.4 6.5
CL 0.29 0.28 0.09  0.10  0.16  0.18

uncertainty in measured dB was about 6%. Since the number of

bubbles processed was 300 for each flow condition in the present
experiment, the uncertainty could be less than 6%.
Measured bubble size distributions are shown in Fig. 2. The size
distribution becomes wider and the mean diameter increases as
the gas flow rate increases. The mean bubble diameters are
summarized in Table 1. The lift coefficients for these mean
diameters were evaluated using the following lift correlation
(Tomiyama et al., 2002):
8 and therefore, the shear field of liquid velocity causing lift force
< min ½0:288 tanhð0:121ReÞ; f ðEoH Þ f or EoH o 4
>
C L ¼ f ðEoH Þ f or 4 r EoH r10:7
>
: 0:29
f or Eo 4 10:7 H discussed the applicability of Eq. (1) to air–water bubbly flows
where
f ðEoH Þ ¼ 0:00105Eo3H 0:0159Eo2H 0:0204EoH þ 0:474
and Re and EoH are the bubble Reynolds number and Eötvös
number defined by
ρL jVB VL jdB
Re ¼
μL
2
ΔρgdH
EoH ¼
s using a volume-of-fluid method. They confirmed that the magni-
where ρL is the liquid density, VB is the bubble velocity, VL is the
liquid velocity, μL is the liquid viscosity, Δρ is the density difference
between the liquid and gas phases, g is the magnitude of the
acceleration of gravity, dH is the bubble major axis, and s is the
surface tension. The bubble Reynolds number and the bubble
major axis were evaluated using a drag correlation proposed by
Tomiyama et al. (1998) and a correlation of bubble aspect ratio
proposed by Vakhrushev and Efremov (1970), respectively.
Eq. (1) was originally proposed using experimental data for
single bubbles in linear shear flows of high viscosity liquids
(glycerol–water solutions). On the other hand, in the present
experiment, bubbles were in bubbly flows of the air–water system,
Fig. 3. Flow structure in symmetric configuration. (a) QB ¼3.0  10  6 m3/s and
(b) 8.3  10  6 m3/s.
may be attributed to the bubble-induced liquid velocity field such
as the screening effect (Koch, 1993). Lucas and Tomiyama (2011)
ð1Þ through literature survey: Lucas et al. (2001) implemented the lift
force, Eq. (1), and a model of turbulence dispersion force (Lahey
et al., 1993) for bubble lateral migration into their simplified multi-
ð2Þ bubble size group model and obtained the transition between wall
and core peaking profiles for poly-dispersed upward air–water
bubbly flows in a vertical pipe. Experiments on poly-dispersed air–
water bubbly flows in a vertical pipe (Prasser et al., 2002)
confirmed that bubbles smaller than 5.5 mm (positive CL regime)
ð3Þ
were found in near wall region, whereas larger bubbles (negative
CL regime) were in the core region. Rabha and Buwa (2010)
investigated lift coefficients of bubbles in multiple-bubble systems
ð4Þ
tude of the lift coefficient in the multiple-bubble system is smaller
than that in a single-bubble system. However it was found that the
tendency regarding the change of the sign of the lift force for the
single-bubble system is similar to that for the multiple-bubble
system. Then Lucas and Tomiyama (2011) found that the change in
the sign of the lift coefficient evaluated by Eq. (1) well describes
the wall and core peaking profiles of void fractions not only for
air–water turbulent bubbly flows but also for steam-water bubbly
flows in a vertical pipe. Therefore Eq. (1) may be used to estimate
the lift coefficient in the present experiment.
As shown in Table 1, CL is small at dB ¼5.4 mm, positive for
dB r5.4 mm and negative for dB Z 6.2 mm. Therefore QA was set at
 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176 169

3.0  10  6 m3/s and QB was varied from 0.9  10  6 to 8.3 

10  6 m3/s. The difference in the total flow rate ( ¼34QA þQB)
between the cases of QB ¼ 3.0  10  6 and 8.3  10  6 m3/s was
þ5.2%, and that between the cases of QB ¼3.0  10  6 and 0.9 
10  6 m3/s was  2.0%.
Images of the flow were taken using a high-speed video camera
(Redlake, Motion Pro X-3). The liquid velocities along the line of
y¼36 mm at 480 mm above the diffuser plate were measured using
a laser Doppler velocimetry system (LDV, DANTEC, optics: 60  83,
processor: 68N10). The forward scattering technique was adopted.
Silicon carbide particles of 3 μm in diameter and 3.21  103 kg/m3
were used as seeding particles. 100,000 data of the vertical
component, wL, of liquid velocity were obtained at each measure-
ment point. The mean liquid velocities and liquid fluctuation
velocities were calculated from these data. The uncertainty esti-
mated at 95% confidence in measured wL was less than 6%.
The void fraction, αG, was measured using an electrical con-
ductivity probe. Measurements at each point were conducted for
15 min with the sampling rate of 4 kHz to obtain time-averaged
data within 73% uncertainty.

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Flow structure

3.1.1. Symmetric configuration (Case Sy)

Fig. 3(a) shows a snapshot of the flow under a uniform inlet
condition, (QA, QB)¼ (3.0  10  6, 3.0  10  6 m3/s). The flow was
homogeneous, i.e., the bubbles distributed uniformly and large-
scale vortical structure was not present. The homogeneous struc-
ture might be due to small magnitude of CL for dB  5.4 mm. The
decrease in QB did not affect the flow structure in Case Sy and
homogeneous structure similar to Fig. 3(a) was kept at
QB ¼0.9  10  6 and 1.5  10  6 m3/s. With a non-uniform inlet
condition, (QA, QB)¼ (3.0  10  6, 8.3  10  6 m3/s), homogeneous
structure similar to Fig. 3(a) was first formed, whereas hetero- Fig. 4. Flow structure in asymmetric configuration. (a) QB ¼ 8.3  10  6 m3/s and
geneous structure intermittently appeared as shown in Fig. 3(b), in (b) 0.9  10  6 m3/s.

which the bubble distribution was not uniform; the direction of

bubble motion near the inlet was largely slanted and the region of
high bubble number density moved toward a side wall, which, in
turn, formed a low bubble number density region near the other
wall. These effects of QB on flow structure imply that the
mechanism of flow instability pointed out by Lucas et al. (2005)
plays a dominant role in the formation of heterogeneous structure
in Case Sy, i.e., large bubbles moving toward a high velocity region
due to a negative lift force initiate the flow instability at high QB,
whereas small bubbles generated at low QB migrate toward a low
velocity region due to a positive lift force so that high liquid
velocity streams causing vortical structure are not formed.
3.1.2. Asymmetric configuration (Case As)
Heterogeneous structure intermittently appeared also in Case
As at high QB as shown in Fig. 4(a). Because the nozzle for QB was
placed near the right wall, bubbles from the nozzle were attracted
to the right wall due to the Coanda effect (Tritton, 1988). The
region of a high bubble number density was therefore formed
along the right wall, which resulted in the formation of column-
height scale counterclockwise vortical structure. The decrease in
QB also changed the flow structure as shown in Fig. 4(b). In this
case, the bubble upward motion at the nozzle of line B was weaker
than those at the other nozzles of line A because of low QB and
liquid downward motion along the right wall. Therefore the
bubbles from line B were apt to move toward the column center
region. The bubble lateral migration toward the center region and
the liquid downward motion along the right wall were the main
cause of the formation of large-scale vortical structure, whereby
the vortical motion was clockwise.
3.2. Occurrence probability of heterogeneous structure
Temporal change of flow structure in Case Sy is shown in Fig. 5.
The flow structure was regarded as heterogeneous when vortical
structure comparable to or larger than the column width was
formed. The flows were always homogeneous at QB ¼0.9  10  6
and 3.0  10  6 m3/s, whereas heterogeneous structure appeared
at higher QB and the duration of heterogeneous structure
increased with QB. Fig. 6 shows temporal change of flow structure
in Case As. Heterogeneous structure was formed for almost all the
measurement time not only at the higher gas flow rates
QB ¼5.0  10  6 and 8.3  10  6 m3/s but also at the lower flow rate
QB ¼0.9  10  6 m3/s.
Fig. 7 shows the time, Tonset, of the first onset of heterogeneous
structure since the aeration started. The measurement of Tonset was
repeated five times in each condition. When QB 4QA, Tonset
decreases with increasing QB and the effect of the location of line
B on Tonset was not significant. The ratio, Phet, of the duration of
heterogeneous structure to the total measurement time was also
measured, for which 20 min observation of flow structure was
repeated five times, i.e., the total observation time was 100 min.
As shown in Fig. 8, Phet also depended mainly on QB when QB 4QA.
The primal factor initiating and maintaining the change in flow
170 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176
Fig. 5. Time history of flow structure in Case Sy (0: homogeneous; 1: heterogeneous).
Fig. 6. Time history of flow structure in Case As (0: homogeneous; 1: heterogeneous).
structure is therefore QB when QB 4QA. It should be noted that Phet
at QB ¼5.0  10  6 m3/s was as many as 40%, despite the fact that
the total flow rate at QB ¼5.0  10  6 m3/s was merely 2% higher
than that at QB ¼ 3.0  10  6 m3/s.
When QB o QA, the flow structure in Case Sy was always
homogeneous. Hence no data of Tonset were plotted and Phet ¼0.
The decrease in QB affects Tonset and Phet in Case As when QB o QA.
The differences in Tonset and Phet between Cases Sy and As imply
that not only QB but also the presence of wall plays an important
role in the formation of heterogeneous structure in Case As.
Fig. 7. Time of the first onset of heterogeneous structure.
Fig. 8. Ratio of the duration of heterogeneous structure to the total measurement
time.
3.3. Void fraction and liquid velocity
Distributions of void fraction αG at QB ¼ 3.0  10  6 and
8.3  10  3 m3/s are compared in Fig. 9. The distribution at QB ¼
3.0  10  6 m3/s was flat because of homogeneous structure.
In Case Sy, the distribution at higher QB was non-uniform. Since
the flow was likely to be heterogeneous in this condition and
the bubble swarm with a relatively high bubble number density
rose mainly in the region of x 4 120 mm during the measure-
ment, the void fraction was larger in x 4 120 mm than in
x o 120 mm. αG in Case As was high near the right wall due to
high QB, whereas αG was almost flat except the region near the
right wall.
The effect of distribution of αG on the vertical component wL of
mean liquid velocity can be clearly seen in Fig. 10, i.e., bubble
swarms of high αG caused a liquid updraft, and therefore a high wL
region appeared in the high αG region. The negative wL at
x¼ 60 mm and QB ¼ 8.3  10  6 m3/s corresponds to the presence
of counterclockwise vortical structure.
Fig. 11 shows liquid fluctuation velocities. The effects of flow
structure and QB were small. The cause of liquid motion was
 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176
Fig. 9. Void fraction.
Fig. 10. Vertical component of liquid velocity.
Fig. 11. Vertical component of liquid fluctuation velocity.
bubble-induced
pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi updraft, and therefore the magnitude of
2 w′L w′L (E0.2 m/s) was comparable to bubble relative veloci-
ties, e.g., the bubble relative velocity estimated using the drag
171
Fig. 12. Turbulence energy spectra of streamwise liquid velocity at x¼ 120 mm and
z¼ 480 mm in Case Sy.
model for a single bubble in stagnant liquid (Tomiyama et al.,
1998) is 0.23 m/s for a 5 mm air bubble in water.
Power spectra, E, of the fluctuation component of the stream-
wise liquid velocity at x ¼120 mm and z ¼480 mm in Case Sy are
shown in Fig. 12. The fast Fourier transform was applied to the
discrete signals of the liquid velocity to obtain the power
spectra. 216 of velocity signals were used. The randomly sampled
velocity signals were re-sampled at the mean data rate,
about 9 ms, using a sample-and-hold interpolation (Mudde
et al., 1997). The cases of QB ¼3.0  10  6, 5.0  10  6 and
8.3  10  6 m3/s, in which heterogeneous structure was formed,
are compared. The trends of E are the same in all the cases. The
decay of E with respect to the angular frequency ω 4 40 rad/s
obeys the Kolmogorov's  5/3 power law, and therefore, the
turbulence eddies are cascaded down from large- to small-scale
eddies as in a single phase turbulent flow. The wavelength, λ, at
ω ¼40 rad/s is about 17 mm, which is larger than the bubble size
( E 5 mm), is close to the pitch between two adjacent nozzles. In
any case, the influence of the flow instability on the cascade
process is not large.
Bubble swarms formed due to lift force rose the column and
caused vortical liquid motion in Case Sy as discussed in Section 3.1.
The characteristic length, L, of the typical vortical structure was
the half of the column width, 120 mm, as shown in Fig. 3. The
order, U, of the liquid velocity was 0.1 m/s. Therefore the smallest
time scale required for the formation of vortical structure after
bubble swarm formation can be estimated as Tf L/U¼ 1.2 s. This
may be consistent with the measured time history in Fig. 5, i.e., the
time interval between two adjacent heterogeneous states was
larger than O(1 s). It is known that the viscous dissipation of large-
scale eddies takes a long time, i.e., the time scale for viscous
dissipation is estimated as Tv L2/ν ¼1.44  104 s, where ν is the
kinematic viscosity of water, so that this dissipation is negligible.
The kinetic energy of the energetic eddies is transferred from them
to smaller eddies by cascade process and is finally dissipated by
the smallest eddies. The time scale, Td, of this energy dissipation
and the dissipation rate ε are estimated as Td L/U¼ 1.2 s and
ε  U3/L ¼8.3  10  3 m2/s3, respectively. Hence the vortical struc-
ture of L  120 mm loses most of its kinetic energy during Td if
there is no energy supply. The lifetime of vortical structure was
much larger than Td as shown in Fig. 5 due to the energy supply by
buoyancy. When heterogeneous structure is formed, the void
fraction in bubble swarms is higher than that in the other region.
For instance, the difference Δα between the highest and mean void
172 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176

0% 4%
6 3
Fig. 13. Void fraction predicted for Case Sy and QB ¼8.3  10 m /s (t increases from (a) to (e) with the interval of 10 s).

fractions is about 0.01 at QB ¼8.3  10  6 m3/s (see Fig. 9). Hence gas phase
the rate of energy supply due to the local disturbance in void
∂nBm
fraction Δα can be estimated as (ΔαΔρgL/ρ)(U/L). The rate of energy þ ∇ U nBm VBm ¼ γ GBm ð7Þ
∂t
supply, ΔαΔρgU/ρ, is therefore estimated as 9.8  10  3 m2/s3,
which is comparable to the order of energy dissipation. This where γGBm is the mass transfer between the mth bubble class and
energy supply is sufficient to maintain the heterogeneous struc- the continuous gas phase. The momentum equation for the
ture for a long time, so that the probability of heterogeneous continuous phase is given by
structure in this case was as high as 80%. The energy supply
decreases as QB decreases. The lifetime of vortical structure there- ∂VC ∇P
þ VC U∇VC ¼  þg
fore decreases as QB decreases. ∂t ρC
 N

1
þ ∇ UαC τC þ αC sκnδ þ ∑ MIBm þ MΓBm ð8Þ
3.4. Numerical simulation α C ρC m¼1

where P is the pressure, g is the acceleration of gravity, τ is the

As shown in the previous sections, bubbly flow is likely to be
viscous stress tensor, κ is the mean curvature, n is the unit normal
heterogeneous even with small disturbance in the inlet condition.
to the interface between the continuous phases, MI is the inter-
In the following, let us examine whether or not the multi-fluid
facial momentum transfer between bubbles and the continuous
model, which is often adopted for simulating bubbly flow in a
liquid, and MΓ is the momentum transfer between bubbles and
bubble column, can reproduce the effect of non-uniformity in the
the continuous gas phase. The mixture density is given by ρC ¼
inlet condition on flow structure.
αLρL þαGρG. The viscous stress of the continuous phase is given by
A hybrid method consisting of a multi-fluid model and an
interface tracking method proposed by Tomiyama et al. (2006) τC ¼ μC ½∇VC þ ð∇VC ÞT  ð9Þ
was used. This method deals with continuum gas and liquid
phases and dispersed bubbles of N bubble classes. Hence the where 1/μC ¼αL/μL þαG/μG and the superscript T denotes the transpose.
volume fractions, αL, αG and αBm, satisfy The surface tension force, sκnδ, is calculated using the continuum
surface force (CSF) model (Brackbill et al., 1992).
N
αL þ αG þ ∑ αBm ¼ 1 ð5Þ The interfacial momentum transfer is given by
m¼1
MIBm ¼ MDBm þ MLBm þ MV Bm þ MTBm ð10Þ
where the subscript L, G and Bm denote the continuous liquid
phase, the continuous gas phase and the mth bubble class, where MD, ML, MV and MT are the momentum transfers due to the
respectively. The continuity equation for the liquid phase is given drag, lift, virtual mass and turbulent dispersion forces, respec-
by tively. MD is given by

∂αL 3  
þ ∇ U αL V C ¼ 0 ð6Þ MDBm ¼ αBm C DBm ρL VBm VC ðVBm VC Þ ð11Þ
∂t 4dBm
where t is the time and the subscript C the mixture of the The drag coefficient CD is evaluated using the following correlation
continuous gas and liquid phases. Note that the continuous gas (Tomiyama et al., 1998):
and liquid phases are dealt with using the one-fluid formulation so    
that VC ¼VG ¼VL. The transport equation of the bubble number 16 48 8 Eo
C D ¼ max min ð1 þ 0:15Re0:687 Þ; ; ð12Þ
density, nBm, is used as the continuity equation of the dispersed Re Re 3 Eo þ 4
 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176 173

where Eo is the Eötvös number defined by 1994)

2 N
ΔρgdBm
EoBm ¼ ð13Þ kL ¼ ∑ αBm jVBm VC j2 ð17Þ
s m¼1

ML is given by The momentum equation for the mth bubble class is given by
MLBm ¼ αBm C LBm ρL ðVBm VC Þ  ∇  VC ð14Þ ∂VBm ∇P MIm
þ VBm U ∇VBm ¼  þ g ð18Þ
∂t ρBm αBm ρBm
The lift correlation, Eq. (1), is adopted for CL. The momentum
transfer due to the virtual mass force is given by To deal with bubbles larger than the computational cell size, a
  shape factor, f, which is a scalar function representing the fraction
∂VBm ∂VC
MVBm ¼ αBm C VBm ρL þ VBm U∇VBm  VC U∇VC ð15Þ of the bubble volume included in each computational cell, is
∂t ∂t
introduced (Tomiyama et al., 2006). The volume fraction, αBm, is
The virtual mass coefficient CV is set at 1/2. MT is given by (Drew calculated by summing up the contributions from surrounding
and Lahey Jr., 1987) cells

MT ¼ C TBm ρL kL θ∇nBm ð16Þ αBm ¼ ∑nBm f Bm Θ ð19Þ

where θ is the bubble volume and kL the turbulence kinetic energy where Θ is the volume of a computational cell.
of the continuous liquid phase given by (Lopez de Bertodano et al.,

Fig. 14. Time-averaged void fraction in Case Sy (time average was taken for 40 s, for Fig. 16. Time-averaged void fraction in Case As (Time average was taken for about
which flow structure was heterogeneous). 900 s).

0% 4%
6 3
Fig. 15. Void fraction predicted for Case As and QB ¼ 8.3  10 m /s (t increases from (a) to (e) with the interval of 10 s).
174 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176
0%
6
Fig. 17. Void fraction predicted for Case As and QB ¼ 0.9  10
Two bubble classes, B1 and B2, were considered; the mean
bubble diameters, dB1 and dB2, of these classes were 5.4 mm
(CL ¼ 0.09) and 6.5 mm (CL ¼  0.18) in the condition of
QA ¼3.0  10  6 m3/s and QB ¼8.3  10  6 m3/s, whereas they were
5.4 and 3.9 mm (CL ¼0.29) in the condition of QA ¼3.0  10  6 m3/s
and QB ¼0.9  10  6 m3/s. The free surface was dealt with an
interface tracking method (Hayashi et al., 2006). The computa-
tional cells were cubes of 6 mm each side. The time step size
was 1 ms. The physical properties of air and water were as follows:
ρG ¼1.2 kg/m3, ρL ¼998 kg/m3, μG ¼1.8  10  5 Pa s, μL ¼1.0  10  3
Pa s and s ¼73  10  3 N/m.
Fig. 13 shows an example of numerical predictions for Case Sy
and QB ¼8.3  10  6 m3/s. In Fig. 13(a), a high void fraction region
was formed in the center of the column due to the accumulation of
bubbles. Then this region shifted toward the left wall (Fig. 13(b)–
(d)). The flow structure in Fig. 13(e) recovered the condition
similar to that in Fig. 13(a). The void fraction averaged for the
time duration of occurrence of heterogeneous structure is com-
pared with the measured data in Fig. 14. The good agreement
implies that heterogeneous structure was well reproduced in the
simulation. In addition, heterogeneous structure with column-
scale vortices was not formed in Case Sy at low QB (0.9  10  6 m3/s)
as in the experiment.
The predicted distribution of void fraction in Case As at
QB ¼8.3  10  6 m3 /s is shown in Fig. 15. A streak of high αG
appeared along the right side wall and column-height scale
vortical structure in counterclockwise rotation was formed due
to this high αG region. This prediction qualitatively agrees with
the observation shown in Fig. 5. This heterogeneous structure
was kept for almost all the time. The time-averaged void
fraction is shown in Fig. 16. The prediction agreed well with
the experiment. At QB ¼ 0.9  10  6 m3 /s, column-height scale
vortical structure of clockwise rotation was well reproduced in
the simulation and heterogeneous structure was kept for
almost all the time as observed in the experiment as shown
in Fig. 17.
Hence the multi-fluid simulation gave good predictions for the
effects of wall and slight non-uniformity in inlet condition on flow
structure.
4%
3
m /s (t increases from (a) to (e) with the interval of 10 s).
4. Conclusions
Experiments on bubby flows in a rectangular column were
carried out to investigate effects of inlet condition on flow
structure. A bubble diffuser plate having 35 nozzles was attached
to the column bottom. The gas flow rates from 34 nozzles were the
same, whereas that from the remaining one nozzle was varied. The
mean bubble diameter in a uniform gas flow condition was
5.4 mm, the lift coefficient, CL, of which is small. The bubbly flow
was homogeneous for the uniform gas flow condition due to small
CL. To examine the effects of CL on flow structure, the mean bubble
diameter at the nozzle of variable gas flow rate was varied from
3.9 mm (CL 40) to 6.5 mm (CL o0). Numerical simulations using a
multi-fluid model were also carried out to examine whether or not
it can reproduce the effect of non-uniformity in inlet condition.
The main conclusions obtained are as follows:
(1) Bubbly flow in a bubble column is apt to be heterogeneous
even with small non-uniformity in the distribution of inlet
gas flow. Even a few percent change in the total gas flow rate
leads to a drastic change in the distributions of void fraction
and velocity of each phase. Hence experimental data
obtained for a bubble column would be useless unless the
inlet condition is well defined and specified with high
accuracy.
(2) When the nozzle causing non-uniform gas inflow was
located in the center of a diffuser plate and the inflow
distribution was symmetric, heterogeneous structure was
formed mainly due to the lift-induced flow instability
pointed out by Lucas et al. (2005), that is, large bubbles
moving toward a high liquid velocity region due to a
negative lift force further increase the liquid updraft and
initiate flow instability.
(3) When the nozzle causing non-uniform gas inflow was located
near the side wall of the column and the inflow distribution
was asymmetric, heterogeneous structure was induced not by
the lift-induced instability but by the Coanda effect.
(4) The multi-fluid model has a potential of predicting the effects
of inlet condition on flow structure in a bubble column.
 Mohd.Hattab. Mohd. Akbar et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 104 (2013) 166–176 175

Nomenclature s surface tension (N/m)

γG mass transfer between bubble and continuous gas phase
CD drag coefficient (s  1)
CL lift coefficient θ bubble volume (m3)
CV virtual mass coefficient Θ volume of computational cell (m3)
dB sphere-volume equivalent bubble diameter (m)
dH bubble major axis (m) Subscripts
Eo Eötvös number, Eo¼ΔρgdB2/s
EoH Eötvös number, EoH ¼ΔρgdH2/s B bubble
f shape factor Bm mth bubble class
g magnitude of acceleration of gravity (m/s2) C continuous phase
g acceleration of gravity (m/s2) G gas phase
kL turbulence kinetic energy of liquid phase (m2/s2) L liquid phase
L characteristic length scale of vortical structure (m)
MI interfacial momentum transfer (N/m3) Superscript
MD drag force (N/m3)
ML lift force (N/m3)
T transpose
MVM virtual mass force (N/m3)
MTB turbulence dispersion force (N/m3)
MΓ momentum transfer between bubbles and continuous
gas phase (N/m3)
n bubble number density (m  3) Acknowledgment
n unit normal to free surface
QA gas flow rate from nozzle of line A (m3/s) The authors would like to express their thanks to Mr. K. Miguchi
QB gas flow rate from nozzle of line B (m3/s) for his assistance in the experiments. This work has been supported
P pressure (Pa) by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) (Grants-in-
Phet ratio of duration of heterogeneous structure to total Aid for Scientific Research (B), No. 24360070).
measurement time
Re Reynolds number, Re¼ρL|VB VL|dB/μL
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