Abstract
Microbubbles are 10–100-μm bubbles with unique properties that find applications in chemical reactions, water aeration, sewage purification, biomedicine, skincare, and mineral flotation. Here, we review microbubbles with focus on basics, analysis, preparation, and applications. Microbubbles preparation can be done by lowering the pressure, by breaking the gas phase, or by electrochemistry. We present applications for improving gas–liquid reactions, wastewater treatment, mineral flotation, drug delivery, drinks, hyperoxia therapy, aquaculture, and agriculture. Industrial use of microbubbles is actually limited by the preparation of stable and uniformly sized microbubbles at large scale.
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Abbreviations
- ΔG:
-
Gibbs free energy change, J
- e :
-
Surface energy, J
- Δe :
-
Surface energy change of nucleation and expansion stage, J
- e 1 :
-
Nucleation surface energy, J
- e 2 :
-
Gas nucleus expansion surface energy, J
- μ :
-
Chemical potential, J/mol
- Δμ :
-
Chemical potential change of cumulative nucleation, J/mol
- W :
-
Gas expansion work, J
- n :
-
Gas cores molecules number
- v :
-
Dissolved gas volume, m3
- p :
-
Environment pressure, Pa
- p 1 :
-
Initial pressure of environment, Pa
- p 2 :
-
Pressure after the environmental change, Pa
- Δp :
-
Difference between the internal pressure of microbubble center and the pressure at infinity away from microbubble center, Pa
- σ :
-
Surface tension of liquid, N/m
- r 0 :
-
Effective radius of gas molecule, m
- r :
-
Microbubble radius, m
- w b :
-
Width of bubble, m
- r´ :
-
First derivatives of r
- r ″ :
-
Second derivatives of r
- r t :
-
Radius when the cavitation bubble is stable, m
- d :
-
Microchannel width, m
- d 0 :
-
Orifice width, m
- d 1 :
-
Inlet 1 width, m
- d 2 :
-
Inlet 2 width, m
- α :
-
Angle
- Δz :
-
Orifice distance, m
- d 32 :
-
Sauter mean diameter of microbubbles, m
- d b :
-
Average bubble diameter corresponding to the atmospheric pressure, m
- d v :
-
Throat diameter, m
- d s :
-
Sparger diameter, m
- d p :
-
Sparger mean pore size, m
- L :
-
Bubble length, m
- Re :
-
Reynolds number
- Re L :
-
Reynolds number of liquid phase
- Re G :
-
Reynolds number of gas phase
- Re G/L :
-
Reynolds number of liquid phase and gas phase
- We :
-
Weber number
- Fr :
-
Froude number
- Ca :
-
Capillary number
- Ca L :
-
Capillary number of liquid phase
- Q G :
-
Gas-phase flow rate, μL/min
- Q L :
-
Liquid-phase flow rate, μL/min
- Φ :
-
Gas–liquid flow ratio
- θ :
-
Entrance angle
- V :
-
Final bubble size, m
- V fill :
-
Bubbles size at the end of filling period, m
- H :
-
Microchannel height, m
- α :
-
Parameter
- t c :
-
Collapse time, ms
- t l :
-
Characteristic time for liquid to pass through the cross section, ms
- u G :
-
Gas velocity, m/s
- u L :
-
Liquid velocity, m/s
- μ G :
-
Gas-phase viscosity, mPa·s
- μ L :
-
Liquid-phase viscosity, mPa·s
- R/W c :
-
The minimum neck radius of the gaseous thread
- T−t :
-
Remaining time
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Financial aid from the following programs is gratefully acknowledged: the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (no. SCU2023D012).
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and analysis were performed by Yuan He and Shengwei Tang. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Yuan He, and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. Jiabei Zhou had made contributions to polishing the language in the revised manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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He, Y., Zhang, T., Lv, L. et al. Application of microbubbles in chemistry, wastewater treatment, medicine, cosmetics, and agriculture: a review. Environ Chem Lett 21, 3245–3271 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10311-023-01640-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10311-023-01640-z