Analysis of Surface Tension in Bubble Sweeping During Subcooled Nucleate Pool Boiling

Bubble dynamics on thin heated wire is not well understood. In this investigation,bubble sweeping phenomenon during subcooled boiling on a platinum micro heating wire,submerged in ultrapure water,was numerically simulated. The results indicate that the bubble coalescence and detachment phenomena could happen isothermally,i. e.,the non-uniform distribution of surface tension or the thermocapillary effect could be neglected in these processes. The bubble-top liquid jet flow is majorly induced by the thermocapillary effect,which is in good agreement with previous analyses. It also shows that bubble sweeping is caused by both the asymmetric temperature distribution near the liquid layer at the bubble bottom and the horizontal thermocapillary effect, which is in good agreement with a corresponding experimental observation.