SCI和EI收录∣中国化工学会会刊

中国化学工程学报 ›› 2022, Vol. 50 ›› Issue (10): 347-351.DOI: 10.1016/j.cjche.2022.06.009

• Chemical Engineering Thermodynamics • 上一篇    下一篇

A new hypothesis for cavitation nucleation in gas saturated solutions: Clustering of gas molecules lowers significantly the surface tension

Zhaoyang Yu1, Jing Li2, Xianren Zhang1   

  1. 1 State Key Laboratory of Organic-Inorganic Composites, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, China;
    2 College of Biomedical Engineering & the Key Laboratory for Medical Functional Nanomaterials, Jining Medical University, Jining 272067, China
  • 收稿日期:2022-03-19 修回日期:2022-06-13 出版日期:2022-10-28 发布日期:2023-01-04
  • 通讯作者: Jing Li,E-mail:lijbuct@163.com;Xianren Zhang,E-mail:zhangxr@mail.buct.edu.cn
  • 基金资助:
    This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21978007).

A new hypothesis for cavitation nucleation in gas saturated solutions: Clustering of gas molecules lowers significantly the surface tension

Zhaoyang Yu1, Jing Li2, Xianren Zhang1   

  1. 1 State Key Laboratory of Organic-Inorganic Composites, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, China;
    2 College of Biomedical Engineering & the Key Laboratory for Medical Functional Nanomaterials, Jining Medical University, Jining 272067, China
  • Received:2022-03-19 Revised:2022-06-13 Online:2022-10-28 Published:2023-01-04
  • Contact: Jing Li,E-mail:lijbuct@163.com;Xianren Zhang,E-mail:zhangxr@mail.buct.edu.cn
  • Supported by:
    This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21978007).

摘要: Cavitation in water generally takes place at much lower negative pressure than predicted from theories. In this work, we try to stress the discrepancy from the influence of the dissolved gas on cavitation nucleation. By combining molecular dynamics simulation and thermodynamic analysis, we evaluated the lowering of surface tension as a function of density of gas molecules in gas clusters formed in aqueous solution. We found that the obtained surface tension of small gas clusters is much more substantially reduced than expected. The surface tension lowering and the non-ideality of gas molecules in the clusters are then taken into account in determining the nucleation of cavitation, and as a consequence, the required negative pressure for cavitation becomes comparable to experimental values. Thus, we give an alternative explanation for the discrepancy of cavitation pressure between experiment and theory, i.e., it is the substantially reduced surface tension for small gas nuclei, which have not been taken into account in theory, along with the ideal gas approxiamtion that induce its deviation from the experimental values.

关键词: Cavitation, Dissolved gas, Thermodynamics, Molecular simulation, Surface tension

Abstract: Cavitation in water generally takes place at much lower negative pressure than predicted from theories. In this work, we try to stress the discrepancy from the influence of the dissolved gas on cavitation nucleation. By combining molecular dynamics simulation and thermodynamic analysis, we evaluated the lowering of surface tension as a function of density of gas molecules in gas clusters formed in aqueous solution. We found that the obtained surface tension of small gas clusters is much more substantially reduced than expected. The surface tension lowering and the non-ideality of gas molecules in the clusters are then taken into account in determining the nucleation of cavitation, and as a consequence, the required negative pressure for cavitation becomes comparable to experimental values. Thus, we give an alternative explanation for the discrepancy of cavitation pressure between experiment and theory, i.e., it is the substantially reduced surface tension for small gas nuclei, which have not been taken into account in theory, along with the ideal gas approxiamtion that induce its deviation from the experimental values.

Key words: Cavitation, Dissolved gas, Thermodynamics, Molecular simulation, Surface tension