title: The effects of ultrasound on micromixing.
abstract: The Villermaux-Dushman reaction is a widely used technique to study micromixing efficiencies with and without sonication. This paper shows that ultrasound can interfere with this reaction by sonolysis of potassium iodide, which is excessively available in the Villermaux-Dushman solution, into triiodide ions. Some corrective actions, to minimize this interference, are proposed. Furthermore, the effect of ultrasonic frequency, power dissipation, probe tip surface area and stirring speed on micromixing were investigated. The power and frequency seem to have a significant impact on micromixing in contrast to the stirring speed and probe tip surface area. Best micromixing was observed with a 24kHz probe and high power intensities. Experiments with different frequencies but a constant power intensity, emitter surface, stirring speed, cavitation bubble type and reactor design showed best micromixing for the highest frequency of 1135kHz. Finally, these results were used to test the power law model of Rahimi et al. This model was not able to predict micromixing accurately and the addition of the frequency, as an additional parameter, was needed to improve the simulations.
authors.affiliation: KU Leuven, Department of Chemical Engineering, Celestijnenlaan 200F, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium; Research Group Lab4U, Faculty of Industrial Engineering, KU Leuven, Universitaire Campus gebouw B bus 8, 3590 Diepenbeek, Belgium.
authors.forename: Jeroen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jordens
authors.affiliation: KU Leuven, Department of Chemical Engineering, Celestijnenlaan 200F, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium.
authors.forename: Bram
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Bamps
authors.affiliation: KU Leuven, Department of Chemical Engineering, Celestijnenlaan 200F, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium; Research Group Lab4U, Faculty of Industrial Engineering, KU Leuven, Universitaire Campus gebouw B bus 8, 3590 Diepenbeek, Belgium.
authors.forename: Bjorn
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Gielen
authors.affiliation: Research Group Lab4U, Faculty of Industrial Engineering, KU Leuven, Universitaire Campus gebouw B bus 8, 3590 Diepenbeek, Belgium.
authors.forename: Leen
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Braeken
authors.affiliation: KU Leuven, Department of Chemical Engineering, Celestijnenlaan 200F, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium. Electronic address: tom.vangerven@cit.kuleuven.be.
authors.forename: Tom
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Van Gerven
keywords: Cavitation; Micromixing; Microstreaming; Modeling; Process intensification; Sonochemistry; Sonolysis; Villermaux–Dushman