Sharif Digital Repository

A novel technique for upscaling of detailed geological reservoir descriptions is presented. The technique aims at reducing both numerical dispersion and homogenization error generated due to incorporating a coarse computational grid and assigning effective permeability to coarse-grid blocks, respectively. In particular, we consider implicit-pressure explicit-saturation scheme where homogenization error impacts the accuracy of the coarse-grid solution of the pressure equation. To reduce the homogenization error, we employ the new vorticity-based gridding that generates a non-uniform coarse grid with high resolution at high vorticity zones. In addition, to control numerical dispersion, we use... 

A typical process in many industrial applications is rising bubble dynamic in viscous liquids like two-phase reactors. Examining the physical behavior of bubbles may improve the understanding of systems regarding design and operation. This study focused on the splitting of bubbles resulting from their impact on solid obstacles. Fragmentation of the bubbles appears in many applications such as lab on a chip in small scale or slug bubbly flow moving upward in a tube in large scales. Using a new index-function model in Lattice Boltzmann technique proposed by “He”, we simulated the deformation and motion of a bubble in different regimes, through which, we accurately captured a sharp interface... 

Interaction between intracellular dynamics and extracellular matrix (ECM) generally occurred into very thin fragment of moving cell, namely lamellipodia, enables all movable cells to crawl on ECM. In fast-moving cells such as fish Keratocytes, Lamellipodia including most cell area finds a fan-like shape during migration, with a variety of aspect ratio function of fish type. In this work, our purpose is to present a novel and more complete two-dimensional continuum mathematical model of actomyosin-cytosolic two-phase flow of a self-deforming Keratocyte with circular spreaded to steady fan-like shape. In the new approach, in addition to the two-phase flow of the F-actin and cytosol, the... 

In this article, the behavior of gas bubbles in tapered fluidized beds is investigated with the use of a two-fluid model incorporating kinetic theory of granular flow. The effects of various parameters such as apex angle, particle size, and particle density on the size distribution and the rise velocity of gas bubbles were examined. In addition, the simulation results for the bubble fraction and axial velocity of gas bubbles were compared with experimental data reported in the literature and good agreement was observed. As the apex angle was increased, the fraction of gas bubbles with large sizes increased and the fraction of bubbles with small sizes decreased. As the particle size... 

In this article, the behavior of gas bubbles in tapered fluidized beds is investigated with the use of a two-fluid model incorporating kinetic theory of granular flow. The effects of various parameters such as apex angle, particle size, and particle density on the size distribution and the rise velocity of gas bubbles were examined. In addition, the simulation results for the bubble fraction and axial velocity of gas bubbles were compared with experimental data reported in the literature and good agreement was observed. As the apex angle was increased, the fraction of gas bubbles with large sizes increased and the fraction of bubbles with small sizes decreased. As the particle size... 

Droplet microfluidic systems have attracted a large amount of research due to their numerous applications in biomedical micro-devices and drug discovery/delivery platforms. One of the most important problems in such systems is to investigate deformation, coalescence, and breakup of droplets within the channel. The present study demonstrates numerical simulation of a falling droplet subject to gravitational force in a channel with embedded rectangular obstacles. The lattice Boltzmann method incorporated using He–Chen–Zhang method for two phase flow is employed. Two rectangular obstacles with inverse aspect ratios are introduced to investigate the mechanism of breakup and deformation of the... 

In this work, coupled Cahn–Hilliard phase field and Navier–Stokes equations were solved using finite element method to address the effects of micro-fracture and its characterizations on water-oil displacements in a heterogeneous porous medium. Sensitivity studies at a wide range of viscosity ratios (M) and capillary numbers (Ca), and the resultant log Ca–log M stability phase diagram, revealed that in both media, with/without fracture, the three regimes of viscous fingering, capillary fingering and stable displacement similarly occur. However, presence of the fracture caused water channeling phenomenon which resulted in reduction of the number of active fingers and hence the final oil... 

Successful designs for an injection process to improve reservoir recovery seek more accurate values of saturation dependent functions, including relative permeability curves. The ignorance on underlying heterogeneity (e.g. layering) might lead to inaccurate predicting of flow behavior in layered heterogeneous porous media. Analysis of experimental core flood results in composite core systems (the system) along with numerical simulation at the core scale can provide an insight into this problem, especially when the capillary effects are present. In this study unsteady state two phase displacements have been conducted on the system with different internal arrangements. The main contribution is... 

The flow and spray parameters can have noticeable roles in heavy fuel oil (HFO) spray finesse. As known, the interaction between droplets and cross flow should be considered carefully in many different industrial applications such as the process burners and gas turbine combustors. So, it would be so important to investigate the effect of injecting HFO into a crossflow more subtly. In this work, the effects of various flow and spray parameters on the droplet breakup and dispersion parameters are investigated numerically using the finite-volume-element method. The numerical method consists of a number of different models to predict the droplets breakup and their dispersion into a cross flow... 

In this paper, transient depressurization of high pressure pipelines containing initially subcooled liquid is simulated numerically by using thermodynamic non-equilibrium and choking condition model. The numerical method relies on finite volume. The convective terms of cell boundaries are discretized by Advection Upstream Splitting Method (AUSM+ - up) with a proposal of partially implicit approach for source terms. Different void fraction correlations are applied to simulate two phase shock tubes as well as the depressurization process. By comparison between the present results and previous experimental data, the best void fraction correlation is introduced. The results indicate that the... 

The vacuum systems play crucial role in various industries including, but not limited to, power generation, refrigeration, desalination, and aerospace engineering. There are different types of vacuum systems. Among them, the ejector or vacuum pump is highly utilized due to its low capital cost and easy maintenance. Generally, the better operation of a vacuum system can dramatically affect the performance of its upper-hand systems, e.g., the general efficiency of a thermal power plant cycle. This can be achieved if such vacuum systems are correctly designed, implemented, and operated. The focus of this work is on an existing steam jet-ejector, whose primary flow is a high pressure superheated... 

In this paper, a two dimensional numerical model for two phase flow is presented. For interface tracking, the FGVT-VOF (Fine Grid Volume Tracking-Volume Of Fluid) method is selected. For momentum advection, an improved approach is used. In this scheme, a volume tracking step is coupled with steps of computations for the advection of momentum. A Reynolds stress algebraic equation has been implemented in the algorithm of turbulent modeling. Standard test cases are used for the verification of interface tracking and hydrodynamic modeling in laminar and turbulent conditions. The test results show that this methodology can be used in different applications of two-phase flow modeling. © Sharif... 

This paper presents a novel coarse grid generation technique based on using vorticity as a measure of the impact of heterogeneity on flow. Vorticity is a maximum when the total flow is high and perpendicular to a large permeability gradient. Maps of vorticity were generated from single-phase flow simulations and used to generate coarse simulation grids from finely gridded geological models. The resulting grid was more refined in areas of high vorticity and coarser in areas of low vorticity. The method is first demonstrated on a simple five-layered model before being applied to three, 2D models of geologically realistic heterogeneity. The homogenized model generated from vorticity maps shows... 

Determining the time of breakthrough of injected water is important when assessing waterflood in an oil reservoir. Breakthrough time distribution for a passive tracer (for example water) in percolation porous media (near the percolation threshold) gives insights into the dynamic behavior of flow in geometrically complex systems. However, the application of such distribution to realistic two-phase displacements can be done based on scaling of all parameters. Here, we propose two new approaches for scaling of breakthrough time (characteristic times) in two-dimensional flow through percolation porous media. The first is based on the flow geometry, and the second uses the flow parameters of a... 

Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) is an important and prevalent technique in biotechnology because of its crucial role in cloning DNA fragments and diagnostic applications. In the present study, a high-throughput two-phase PCR device is designed and fabricated which utilizes a serpentine microchannel together with a spiral structure. The former is for the droplet-generation and mixing and the latter is for the thermal cycling process. Moreover, the effect of diamond nanoparticles (diamondNP) on the performance of PCR is also investigated while using commercial PCR devices and the fabricated PCR device designed in this study. Using numerical simulation, it is shown that within the simple and... 

Interacting capillary bundle model has been much attended for modeling of imbibition process, however, how the tube morphology controls the front displacement is not well discussed in the available literature, especially when corner flow of wetting phase is considered. Tubes with non-circular cross-sections were used for simulating imbibition process performed on drained bundle of tubes. Different combinations of the interacting tubes with equilateral triangular, square, and circular cross sections were used in the bundle model to explore the role of capillary morphology. The evolution of displacement front, as well as transient water saturation profiles along the model, were obtained for... 

By reducing the exploration of new oil reservoirs, enhanced oil recovery from previous oil reservoirs is a solution to supply energy demand. In order to develop the production, various technologies and methods have been proposed such as steaming, direct heating, flooding by nano-fluid, chemical injection, polymer injection and etc. In the present study, nanofluid flooding has been attempted on a rock reservoir with incomplete cone geometry and its performance has been evaluated on oil recovery. The porous media is considered heterogeneous in simulation in accordance with oil reservoirs. The heterogeneous geometry considered in this study is incomplete cone that is heterogeneous in a random... 

Studying the dynamic behavior of droplets is of great importance in the electrowetting phenomena. However, despite the widespread use of non-Newtonian fluids in industry and daily life including medicine, food, petroleum, environmental biomass, and lab on a chip, most studies have focused on Newtonian fluids. In this study, a power-law fluid is considered as a typical example of non-Newtonian fluids and its dynamic behavior is investigated within a microchannel, and the results are compared with those of the Newtonian fluids. Both the grooved and non-grooved substrates are considered. For this purpose, the governing equations for the two phase fluid flow are solved using the finite element... 

In this work, phase-field method is used to develop a numerical model to simulate two-phase flow through a heterogeneous fractured porous medium. Various sensitivity analyses were performed to assess the impact of wettability, fracture aperture, interfacial tension, and water injection velocity on the displacement process. It was observed that the water mass imbibed into the matrix block varies linearly with time before the water front meets the outlet, known as “filling fracture” regime, which is captured for the first time in a numerical study. It is revealed that increasing the fracture aperture reduces water breakthrough time and oil recovery. © 2020 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC  

The efficiency of low salinity waterflooding, particularly during tertiary mode injection, is highly controlled by in situ mixing between the stagnant regions holding high salinity water (HSW) and the flowing regions containing low salinity water (LSW) because it impacts directly the electrokinetics of wettability alteration and the time scale of the low salinity effect. This study aims to address the effects of oil polarity and charged rock surfaces on the time scale of mixing and transport under two-phase flow conditions. A systematic series of micromodel experiments were performed. The micromodels were first saturated with high salinity formation brine and oil (both model and crude oil);...