Bubble interaction with moderate Re crossflow over a cylinder

Bluff-body vortex shedding can appear in offshore structures and heat exchangers. It was previously observed that introducing bubbles can modify the shedding frequency. Past studies also demonstrated that shedding frequency is dependent on both bubble size distribution and gas volume fraction (α). To gain insight on how bubbles of various size interact with the carrier phase during shedding, we observed bubble transport initially at ultra-low void fractions of α<0.01% and Reynolds number up to 25,000 using pressure-synchronized tomographic bubble tracking and Stereo PIV experiments supplemented by one-way coupled numerical bubble transport studies utilizing LES-generated velocity fields. This talk focuses on methods utilized in the acquisition as well as the development of appropriate scaling parameters and analysis tools for the interpretation of this rich dataset.