Fluid flow simulation on a Turritella-seashell-like geometry demonstrating its ability as static mixer for inline mixing

Inspired by the turritella's unique hydrodynamic behaviour of self-orientation parallel to the current and specialization in burrowing, here, we demonstrate that a turritella-seashell-like geometry can serve as an effective static mixer insert to induce inline mixing in a pipe. A method to mathematically parametrize a simplified turritella-seashell-like geometry is presented. Through CFD studies, a two-step mixing mech-anism is proposed and its performance is investigated as a function of the inlet velocity, pipe diameter, surface boundary conditions and insert geometry parameters. The mixing output is nearly independent of the inlet velocity in the studied range. The no-slip boundary condition at the pipe wall is essential in cre-ating shearing in the fluid, without which no mixing is observed. The insert geometry can be tuned to minimize the pressure drop by over 40% without significantly affecting the mixing output. The insights obtained herewith are discussed in interest of designing new static mixers.(c) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.