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Density segregation of dry and wet granular mixtures in gas fluidized beds
Author(s) -
Seah Stella Lin Li,
Lim Eldin Wee Chuan
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
aiche journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.958
H-Index - 167
eISSN - 1547-5905
pISSN - 0001-1541
DOI - 10.1002/aic.14959
Subject(s) - fluidization , drag , capillary action , agglomerate , discrete element method , fluidized bed , mixing (physics) , particle (ecology) , mechanics , bubble , granular material , chemistry , materials science , composite material , physics , oceanography , organic chemistry , quantum mechanics , geology
The Discrete Element Method combined with Computational Fluid Dynamics was coupled to a capillary liquid bridge force model for computational studies of mixing and segregation behaviors in gas fluidized beds containing dry or wet mixtures of granular materials with different densities. The tendency for density segregation decreased with increasing fluidizing velocity, coefficient of restitution, and amount of liquid present. Due to the presence of strong capillary forces between wet particles, there was a high tendency for particles to form agglomerates during the fluidization process, resulting in lower segregation efficiency in comparison with fluidization of dry particles. Particle‐particle collision forces were on average stronger than both fluid drag forces and capillary forces. The magnitudes of drag forces and particle‐particle collision forces increased with increasing fluidizing velocity and this led to higher mixing or segregation efficiencies observed in dry particles as well as in wet particles at higher fluidizing velocities. © 2015 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J , 61: 4069–4086, 2015