Chemical Engineering & Technology, Vol.42, No.8, 1691-1701, 2019
Modeling Emulsification in Static Mixers: Equilibrium Correlations versus Population Balance Equations
Two different modeling approaches are adopted to model turbulent breakage during continuous emulsification in static mixers. First, a correlation is developed to predict the droplet mean diameter. Second, a population balance equation (PBE) is applied to track the droplet size distribution (DSD) using two different breakage kernels. The performances of the two approaches are assessed against a large number of experimental data. The correlation is fast to develop and is found to be capable of predicting the mean diameter with an acceptable accuracy while the PBE-based model gives an excellent prediction of the entire DSD.
Keywords:Droplet breakage;Droplet size distribution;Population balance;Static mixers;Turbulent emulsification