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Atomization Research

Atomizer Design for Green Energy

What’s Involved in this Research?

“Multiphase” flows, those involving mixtures of liquids, gases, and granular solids, are everywhere we look from fizzing sodas to lawn sprinklers.

God’s majestic creation is also enamored with multiphase physics in waterfalls, rainy days, rivers, dust storms, and erupting volcanos.  Within these mixtures of phases are intricate tug-o-war challenges between forces, such as surface tension, gravity, and pressure. 

For example, in the lawn sprinkler, water is forced through tiny holes by way of the water line pressure in your home.  As the water exits the holes, it cannot handle the drag it encounters by the warm summer air.  Therefore, it must divide and conquer by breaking up into small droplets (a process known as “atomization”) which gently settle on your lawn.


How Students Benefit

Students are challenged in thinking outside their typical spheres of influence to consider the global impact of seemingly too-detailed of a science. They consider how micron-sized droplets can be used to solve problems and bring together communities across all continents. Students learn how to connect computer programming with missions-mindedness. Students are working in two areas to help with this. The first involves undergraduates who are searching for ways that atomization can be used to address the worlds “Grand Challenges,” which include things like green energy and clean water. The second involve graduate students performing detailed calculations and computer programming to assess atomization quality.

Dr. Strasser leads a research program here at Liberty called “FLUID,” which stands for “Fluids at Liberty University for Innovation and Design”.  “Fluids,” in this case, refers to study of dynamic motions of liquids, gases, and granular solids we find in many biological, physical, chemical, industrial, and engineering systems. He works with graduate and undergraduate students in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), which is the use of around-the-clock mathematical modeling on hundreds of computers to solve complex problems involving the movement of energy, mass, and momentum.

Dr. Wayne Strasser
B.S., M.S., Ph.D., P.E.
Professor of Mechanical Engineering
Google Scholar Profile


Impact on Society

Because of the CFD-based research like that we are carrying out at LU, the goods and food you purchase are cheaper and safer.  Waste facilities are downsized, struggling people groups are helped, and the cars you drive are cleaner and more efficient.


Articles

  • Strasser. 2020. Towards Atomization for Green Energy: Viscous Slurry Core Disruption By Feed Inversion. Atomization and Sprays (Submitted).
    Leonard, Strasser, Whittle, DeBellis, Prichard, Atwood, and Dungan. 2020. Reducing Aerosol Dispersion by High Flow Therapy in COVID-19: High-Resolution Computational Fluid Dynamics Simulations of Particle Behavior during High-Velocity Nasal Insufflation with a Simple Surgical Mask. Journal of the American College of Emergency Physicians, Accepted for Publication.
  • Leonard, Atwood, Walsh, DeBellis, Dungan, Strasser, Whittle. 2020. Preliminary Findings of Control of Dispersion of Aerosols and Droplets during High -Velocity Nasal Insufflation Therapy Using a Simple Surgical Mask: Implications for High Flow Nasal Cannula. CHEST (Available Online April 2, 2020)
  • Strasser. 2019. The War on Liquids: Disintegration and Reaction by Enhanced Pulsed Blasting. Chemical Engineering Science 216; 115458
  • Strasser. 2018. Oxidation-Assisted Pulsating Three-Stream Non-Newtonian Slurry Atomization For Energy Production. Chemical Engineering Science 196; 214-224.
  • Strasser and Battaglia. 2018. Pulsating Slurry Atomization, Film Thickness, and Azimuthal Instabilities. Atomization and Sprays 28; 643-672.
  • Strasser and Strasser. 2017. Challenging Paradigms by Optimizing Combustible Dust Separator. Journal of Fluids Engineering 140(7).
  • Strasser and Battaglia. 2017. The Effects of Prefilming Length and Feed Rate on Compressible Flow in a Self-Pulsating Injector. Atomization and Sprays 27; 929-947.
  • Strasser and Battaglia. 2017. The Effects of Pulsation and Retraction on Non-Newtonian Flows in Three-Stream Injector Atomization Systems. Chemical Engineering Journal 309, 532–544.
  • Strasser and Battaglia. 2016. Identification of Pulsation Mechanism in a Transonic Three-Stream Airblast Injector. Journal of Fluids Engineering 138(11).
  • Strasser and Battaglia. 2016. The Influence of Retraction on Three-Stream Injector Pulsatile Atomization for Air-Water Systems. Journal of Fluids Engineering 138(11).
  • Strasser and Chamoun. 2014. Wall Temperature Considerations in a Two-Stage Swirl Non-premixed Furnace, Progress in Computational Fluid Dynamics 14, No. 6, 386-397.
  • Dhakal, Walters, and Strasser. 2013. Numerical Study of Gas-Cyclone Air Flow: An Investigation of Turbulence Modeling Approaches. International Journal of CFD 28, 1-15.
  • Strasser and Wonders. 2011. Commercial Scale Slurry Bubble Column Reactor Hydro-Kinetic Optimization. AIChE Journal 58, 3; 946-956.
  • Strasser. Towards the Optimization of a Three-Stream Coaxial Airblast Injector. International Journal of Multiphase Flow 37, 7; 831-844.
  • Strasser. 2010. CFD Study of an Evaporative Trickle Bed Reactor: Mal-distribution and Thermal Runaway Induced by Feed Disturbances. Chemical Engineering Journal 161, 257-268.
  • Strasser. 2010. Cyclone-ejector coupling and Optimisation. Progress in Computational Fluid Dynamics 10, 19-31.
  • Strasser. 2008. Discrete particle study of turbulence coupling in a confined jet gas-liquid separator. Journal of Fluids Engineering 130, 1 –11.
  • Strasser. 2007. CFD Investigation of Gear Pump Mixing Using Deforming/Agglomerating Mesh. Journal of Fluids Engineering 129, 476 – 484.
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