Numerical investigation on influence of micro-gravity magnitude on phase distribution and liquid turbulence statistics in bubbly flow

In view of a wide application prospect of bubbly flows in space, it is necessary to deeply understand the influence of microgravity magnitude on the phase distribution and liquid turbulence. An Euler-Lagrange model was developed and used to investigate the influence of the microgravity magnitude on the phase distribution and liquid turbulence. The velocity field of liquid was solved by Direct Numerical Simulations (DNS), and the bubble trajectories were tracked by Newtonian equation of motion. The results show that the bubble distribution and liquid turbulence have a direct relation with the microgravity magnitude. For the computational case with a relatively low gravity magnitude, bubbles roughly uniformly disperse in the channel, and the injection of bubbles has almost no influence on the liquid turbulence. However, when the gravity magnitude is relatively high, most of bubbles accumulate near the wall, and the liquid turbulence is greatly modulated due to the injection of bubbles.