Numerical simulation of a bubble rising in shear-thinning fluids

The motion of a single bubble rising freely in quiescent non-Newtonian viscous fluids was investigated experimentally and computationally. The non-Newtonian effects in the flow of viscous inelastic fluids are modeled by the Carreau rheological model. An improved level set approach for computing the incompressible two-phase flow with deformable free interface is used. The control volume formulation with the SIMPLEC algorithm incorporated is used to solve the governing equations on a staggered Eulerian grid. The simulation results demonstrate that the algorithm is robust for shear-thinning liquids with large density (ρ1/ρg up to 103) and high viscosity (η1/ηg up to 104). The comparison of the experimental measurements of terminal bubble shape and velocity with the computational results is satisfactory. It is shown that the local change in viscosity around a bubble greatly depends on the bubble shape and the zero-shear viscosity of non-Newtonian shear-thinning liquids. The shear-rate distribution and velocity fields are used to elucidate the formation of a region of large viscosity at the rear of a bubble as a result of the rather stagnant flow behind the bubble. The numerical results provide the basis for further investigations, such as the numerical simulation of viscoelastic fluids.