International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol.39, No.16, 3475-3482, 1996
Holographic Study of Suspended Vaporizing Volatile Liquid Droplets in Still Air
The data presented here describe the dynamics of vaporization of a single suspended droplet of chloroform, acetone and diethyl ether at room temperature and pressure in still air. The dual hologram technique was applied for direct measurements of the radial distribution of the change in the-refractive index caused by the vapor molecules, Delta n, in the vicinity of the vaporizing volatile liquid droplets as a function of time and droplet size. Delta n was found to be a function of the similar dimensionless variable r/a where a is the droplet radius. Delta n drops exponentially and exhibits an effect of free convection : In addition, it was found for all three substances that b, the radial distance at which the abrupt vapor concentration decrease occurs, is independent of drop size, i.e. the boundary of convection does not change in time. The reduction of interferometric data made it possible to determine saturation pressures, vapor densities and temperatures at the droplet surface. The variation of vapor density versus the dimensionless variable r/a was obtained from the interferometric measurements by assuming a theoretical temperature distribution. The vaporizing rate constants, K, and internal droplet temperatures T-i were measured at conditions where intensive heat transfer through the suspending fiber and thermocouple took place.