Fluid physics of a rotating membrane separator

Rotating membrane separation is a powerful dynamic filtration technique used in separation and filtration of suspensions. Rotating membrane separation is superior compared to the conventional filtration techniques owing to the special character of the flow field, namely the supercritical cylindrical Couette flow, observed in the form of nonwavy and wavy toroidal vortices. The underlying physics are investigated by extending the previous particle image velocity (PIV) measurements performed in a radial-axial plane to a radial-azimuthal plane for nonwavy Taylor Couette flow and wavy cylindrical Couette flow. These measurements are matched to previous measurements to obtain the first time-resolved, three-dimensional, three-component velocity field for cylindrical Couette flow.; The nonwavy toroidal vortices of Taylor-Couette flow become stronger with increasing Taylor number. The azimuthal velocity varies axially due to the redistribution of the azimuthal momentum by the vortical motion, which results in a substantial increase in the angular momentum at outflow regions and a decrease at inflow regions. For wavy vortex flow, the waviness of the vortices results in a variation of the azimuthal velocity in any given latitudinal place. Streams of axial flow carry fluid along the length of the annulus winding around the vortices radially from the inner cylinder to the outer cylinder, and azimuthally about one-half wavelength. The azimuthal velocity near the centers of the vortices is similar to the velocity of the traveling azimuthal wave. Large shear stresses occur near the inner and outer cylinders especially at the high Taylor numbers. In the middle of the annulus, the shear stress is substantially less.; In filtration flow, where radial and axial flows are imposed on cylindrical Couette flow, simultaneous use of particle image velocimetry (PIV) and particle tracking velocimetry (PTV) provides fluid and particle velocities. Results indicate no major differences in the fluid and particle velocities for the range of parameters considered. At low speeds of rotation of the inner cylinder, a cake layer forms on the porous inner cylinder resulting in a substantial decrease in the filrate flow rate. At high speeds of rotation the cake layer thickness decreases, but the resulting reduction in filtrate flow persists.; Finally, fluid particles are computationally tracked using the experimentally obtained three dimensional velocity for wavy cylindrical Couette flow. The fluid particles experience increased chaotic mixing with increasing Taylor numbers. The axial and radial dispersion is enhanced by increasing vortical motion and transfer of fluid between vortices.