Lattice Boltzmann method for simulation of wettable particles at a fluid-fluid interface under gravity.

Abstract

A computational technique was developed to simulate wettable particles trapped at a fluid-fluid interface under gravity. The proposed technique combines the improved smoothed profile-lattice Boltzmann method (iSP-LBM) for the treatment of moving solid-fluid boundaries and the free-energy LBM for the description of isodensity immiscible two-phase flows. We considered five benchmark problems in two-dimensional systems, including a stationary drop, a wettable particle trapped at a fluid-fluid interface in the absence or presence of gravity, two freely moving particles at a fluid-fluid interface in the presence of gravity (i.e., capillary floatation forces), and two vertically constrained particles at a fluid-fluid interface (i.e., capillary immersion forces). The simulation results agreed well with theoretical estimations, demonstrating the efficacy of the proposed technique.