Method of mass production of monodisperse microbubbles aided by intense pressure gradients

Abstract

Here we present a method for producing noncoalescing monodisperse microbubbles in an efficient, massive and controlled way. Since our prototype is easily scalable, it can be straightforwardly adapted to satisfy the specific gas injection demands required by the different applications where it can be used, like bioreactors or water treatment or purification plants. The main feature of the bubbling device described here consists of injecting the gas at the leading edge of a wing in relative motion with respect to a liquid. The reasons for this particular design relies on the smallness of the drag coefficient of streamlined bodies and also on the fact that the strongest favorable pressure gradients and the minimum values of the liquid pressures are located at the leading edge of the airfoils composing the wing. © 2020 American Institute of Chemical Engineers