Rocco Portaro

CFD MODELING OF HIGH SPEED LIQUID JETS FROM AN AIR-POWERED NEEDLE-FREE INJECTION SYSTEM

A liquid jet injector is a biomedical device intended for drug delivery. Medication is delivered through a fluid stream that penetrates the skin. This small diameter liquid stream is created by a piston forcing a fluid column through a nozzle. These devices can be powered by springs or compressed gas. In this study, a CFD simulation is carried out to investigate the fluid mechanics and performance of needle free injectors powered specifically by compressed air. The motion of the internal mechanisms of the injector which propels a liquid jet through an orifice is simulated by the moving boundary method and the fluid dynamics is modeled using LES/VOF techniques. In this paper, numerical results are discussed by comparing the fluid stagnation pressures of the liquid jet with previously published experimental measurements obtained using a custom-built prototype of the air-powered needle free liquid injector. Performance plots as a function of various injector parameters are presented and explained.

Optimization of drug viscosity used in gas-powered liquid jet injectors.

This paper describes the effect of drug viscosity on the performance of gas powered liquid jet injectors. The analysis is accomplished utilizing a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) model that obtains the stagnation pressure at the nozzle outlet. The technique is based on previous work used to predict gas power driven injector piston velocity with time. The results depict the variation in average and peak injector stagnation pressure for three different driven pressures; driving injections which vary from 0.2 cP to 87 cP in viscosity. Furthermore, a numerical representation of jet shape is also obtained to verify the effect of viscosity on jet geometry. These results demonstrate that increasing viscosity by 10 times that of water produces only a slight decrease in injector stagnation pressure and produces jets with greater confinement, which will display better characteristics for puncturing the skin.

Experimental analysis of the performance of an air-powered needle-free liquid jet injector

An experimental study was performed using a custom-built air-powered needle-free injector to investigate the various injector parameters governing the dynamics of jet injection. A parametric study using five different nozzle sizes at driver pressure ranging from 4 to 8 bar was carried out. The fluid stagnation pressure of the liquid jet was determined using a Honeywell force sensor. Performance plots as a function of various parameters were constructed. It was determined that as the driver pressure increased both the peak and average stagnation pressure increased almost linearly within the operating range considered. Varying the injection nozzle diameter, whilst keeping the driver pressure constant did not have any significant impact on the peak or average stagnation pressure. The chamber length was also varied and no significant influence was found on peak or average stagnation pressure.

FRACTAL GEOMETRY OF THE WAKE SHED BY A FLAPPING FILAMENT IN FLOWING SOAP-FILM

In this study, we illustrate the fractal nature of the wake shed by a periodically flapping filament. Such wake structure is a combination of primary vortex shedding resulting in the von Karman vortex street, a series of concentrated vortex dipoles formed when the trailing edges of filaments reach their maximum amplitudes and small eddies form along the shear layer connected with the concentrated vortices due to the shear layer instability. The vortex dynamics of the flapping filament are visualized and imaged experimentally using a soap-film flow tunnel with a high-speed camera and a low pressure sodium lamp as a light source. The wake fractal geometry is measured using the standard box-counting method and it is shown that the fractal dimension of the soap pattern boundaries in the wake is D = 1.38 ± 0.05, which agrees well with those measured for fully developed turbulences and other shear flow phenomena. The invariant of the fractality in the wake induced by the flapping filament thus provides another illustration of the geometrical self-similarity and nonlinear dynamics of chaotic fluid flows.

CFD analysis of unsteady flow through conjoining Aorta and aortic isthmus.

The initial stages of fetal development require that blood oxygenation occur through the placenta rather than the non functioning lungs. As a result the fetal circulatory system develops a temporary shunt between the aorta and pulmonary artery, known as the ductus arteriosis (DA). This study utilizes CFD techniques to analyze the flow behavior in the aortic isthmus neighboring the DA. The geometry used to represent these structures is equivalent to that of a 25 week old fetus. The effect of aortic and pulmonary pressure pulse wave delay is examined for producing flow disturbances in the fetal circulatory system. This is accomplished by analyzing both axial and tangential flow fields downstream of the DA. The study demonstrates that there exist different swirl profiles that are related to the timing of pulse contributions from both the left and right ventricles.

Analysis of a Quick-Acting Diaphragmless Shock Tube Driver

Shock waves play integral roles in many industrial, medical and scientific environments, consequently it is important to observe the behavior of these waves and how they interact with their surroundings; see the review paper by Takayama and Saito [1].