• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.47 no.5
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• pp.513-522
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• 2015

The present paper aims at improving the modeling of turbulence for the upward turbulent bubbly flow through the use of experimental databases that contain data on small and large vertical ducts. First, the role of bubble-induced turbulence was analyzed, which indicated the dominant role of the bubble-induced turbulence in the duct center for relatively high void fraction cases. Therefore, the turbulence therein was mainly focused on, which indicated that the stronger turbulence could be induced by bubbles in large ducts with similar void fractions as compared to that in small ducts. Next, the turbulence of upward turbulent bubbly flow near the wall is discussed to understand the interaction between the wall-induced and bubble-induced turbulence. It showed that the existence of a wall could suppress the bubble-induced turbulence given the same void fraction, and the existence of bubbles could also suppress the solely wall-induced turbulence as compared to the single-phase turbulent flow, even though the total turbulence is enhanced. The above characteristics indicated that the current turbulence modeling method needs to be modified, especially when the bubble-induced turbulence plays a dominant role.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.11
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• pp.3973-3982
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• 2023

As for two-phase flow in rectangular channels, the flow regimes especially like churn-turbulent and annular flow are significant for the physical problem like Countercurrent Flow Limitation (CCFL). In this study, the rectangular channels with cross-sections of 4 × 66 mm, 6 × 66 mm, 8 × 66 mm are adopted to investigate the flow regimes of air-water vertical upward two phase flow under adiabatic condition. The gas and liquid superficial velocities are 0 ≤ j_g ≤ 20m/s and 0.25 ≤ j_f ≤ 3m/s respectively which covering bubbly to annular flow. The flow regimes are identified by random forest algorithm and the flow regime maps are obtained. As the results, the transitional void fraction from slug to churn turbulent flow fluctuate from 0.47 to 0.58 which is significantly affected by the dimensional size of channel and flow rate. Besides, the void fraction at transitional points from churn-turbulent (slug) to annular flow are 0.66-0.67, which are independent with the gap size. Furthermore, a new criteria of slug to churn-turbulent flow is established in this study. In addition, by introducing the interfacial force model, the criteria of churn-turbulent (slug) flow to annular flow is verified.