Forces Acting on Submillimeter Spheres at the Air-Water Interface

The forces acting on submillimeter spheres at the air-water interface are investigated theoretically and experimentally. To calculate the capillary force acting on the sphere, an iterative method is used to determine the immersing position of the liquid interface on the sphere for a given distance. Then the total forces acting on the sphere are considered. The scaling effects of the net force acting on the sphere at the air-water interface are demonstrated. For the experiments, the force-position relationship of microspheres is measured with a precise electronic balance. The results show that the evaporation of the liquid in the container affects the measuring results greatly under ambient conditions. After considering the evaporation compensation, there is a great agree- ment between the theoretical and experimental results. Obvious hysteresis phenomena of the force-distance curve during the emersion processes are also observed and explained.

Sharp interface direct forcing immersed boundary methods： A summary of some algorithms and applications

Body-fitted mesh generation has long been the bottleneck of simulating fluid flows involving complex geometries. Immersed boundary methods are non-boundary-conforming methods that have gained great popularity in the last two decades for their simplicity and flexibility, as well as their non-compromised accuracy. This paper presents a summary of some numerical algori- thms along the line of sharp interface direct forcing approaches and their applications in some practical problems. The algorithms include basic Navier-Stokes solvers, immersed boundary setup procedures, treatments of stationary and moving immersed bounda- ries, and fluid-structure coupling schemes. Applications of these algorithms in particulate flows, flow-induced vibrations, biofluid dynamics, and free-surface hydrodynamics are demonstrated. Some concluding remarks are made, including several future research directions that can further expand the application regime of immersed boundary methods.

Particles dispersion on fluid-liquid interfaces

This paper is concerned with the dispersion of particles on the fluid-liquid interface. In a previous study we have shown that when small particles, e.g., flour, pollen, glass beads, etc., contact an air-liquid interface, they disperse rapidly as if they were in an explosion. The rapid dispersion is due to the fact that the capillary force pulls particles into the interface causing them to accelerate to a large velocity. In this paper we show that motion of particles normal to the interface is inertia dominated; they oscillate vertically about their equilibrium position before coming to rest under viscous drag. This vertical motion of a particle causes a radially-outward lateral （secondary） flow on the interface that causes nearby particles to move away. The dispersion on a liquid-liquid interface, which is the primary focus of this study, was relatively weaker than on an air-liquid interface, and occurred over a longer period of time. When falling through an upper liquid the particles have a slower velocity than when falling through air because the liquid has a greater viscosity. Another difference for the liquid-liquid interface is that the separation of particles begins in the upper liquid before the particles reach the interface. The rate of dispersion depended on the size of the particles, the densities of the particle and liquids, the viscosities of the liquids involved, and the contact angle. For small particles, partial pinning and hysteresis of the three-phase contact line on the surface of the particle during adsorption on liquid-liquid interfaces was also important. The frequency of oscillation of particles about their floating equilibrium increased with decreasing particle size on both air-water and liquid-liquid interfaces, and the time to reach equilibrium decreased with decreasing particle size. These results are in agreement with our analysis.

Experimental research and numerical simulation of RC beams strengthened with bonded steel plates

It is a common method to strengthen the damaged RC structures with bonded steel plates. At present the ultimate bearing ca- pacity of RC structures strengthened with bonded steel plates is calculated mostly using the theory based on the test. Four beams, including one reference beam, two strengthened concrete beams in primary force and secondary force respectively, and one strengthened concrete beam which was not anchored enough, were tested under four-point bending (4PB) in order to get the data of strain of longitudinal bars, bonded bottom steel plate in tension and deflection of beams in the middle span. The experimental program was supported by a three-dimensioned finite analysis using ABAQUS. At the end of experiments and finite analysis, it is concluded that the investing strengthening technique can significantly improve the load-carrying capacity and the phenomenon of stress concentration at the end of interface, as well as the damage at interface, can be well simulated with cohesive element provided by ABAQUS.