Describing the drying and solidification behavior of single suspension droplets using a novel unresolved CFD-DEM simulation approach

With increasing computational capacities and advances in numerical methods, a simulation-based process and product design approach for spray dried products has become the focus of many researchers. In this context, a novel unresolved CFD-DEM simulation approach for single suspension droplets is presented, which models the drying and solidification process in a hot gas environment. The solidification process is described by the formation of bonds between the primary particles in the suspension droplet, showing a plausible solidification behavior, which starts when a critical solid concentration is reached at the droplet surface. The drying conditions for the single-droplet simulations are determined from a large-scale spray dryer simulation for different droplet size classes. The resulting solid particles from the CFD-DEM simulation show a higher tendency to form hollow particles at high drying rates when the locking point is reached at earlier stages of the drying process. Using these results, suitable operating conditions for the spray dryer can be determined, which favor the formation of particles with a targeted morphology.

Subjects

CFD-DEM simulation

particle morphology

product design

single droplet

spray drying

VOF method

DDC Class

660: Chemistry; Chemical Engineering

Funding Organisations

BASF SE

Publication version

publishedVersion

Lizenz

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Name

processes-12-00480-v2.pdf

Type

Main Article

Size

7.96 MB

Format

Adobe PDF

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Describing the drying and solidification behavior of single suspension droplets using a novel unresolved CFD-DEM simulation approach