June 3, 2019 at 10:00 am in Yost 306

Title: Bubble Formation and Behavior in Non-Newtonian Fluids

Thesis Advisor: Dr. Wojbor Woyczynski

Abstract

Conditions for bubble cavitation and behavior in non-Newtonian fluids have numerous applications in physical sciences, engineering and medicine. Non-Newtonian fluids are a rich, but relatively undeveloped area of fluid dynamics, with phenomena from diffusion to bubble growth just beginning to receive attention. In the course of examining bubble cavitation, it became apparent that the random particle motion responsible for determining potential bubble formation had not been researched. As cavitation bubbles collapse, they deform into variety of non-spherical shapes and due to the complex dynamics and the radial focus of current equations on bubble behavior, no accepted model has yet emerged. This work explores the behavior using numerical methods on both fluid and bubble models to examine this system from different prospectives, culminating in a time-fractional, power-law Burger’s type equation showing bubble formation under these conditions.