Interfacial relaxation of droplets caused by mass transfer in a pulsed column

Abstract

The method developed in our previous work (Wang et al., AIChE J. 2020; 66(8): e16257), was used to study the influence of the mass‐transfer direction and flux on the dynamic interfacial tension (DIFT) in a pulsed column. The breakup frequency was the highest near the entrance of the dispersed droplet, corresponding to the lowest interfacial tension and highest mass transfer flux. The decrease in the interfacial tension was proportional to the square root of mass‐transfer flux, and this difference is defined as a new parameter, named interfacial relaxation. When the mass‐transfer direction was changed from the dispersed phase to continuous phase to the opposite direction, the proportion of binary breakage was decreased from ~80% to ~40% and the interfacial relaxation was more sensitive to the mass‐transfer flux. A DIFT model was finally established based on the interfacial relaxation parameter, which predicted the experimental results with an error of ±10%.