Single-bubble growth in microgravity featured on the cover of Physics of Fluids
2026/01/03 by Axel Sielaff
Our latest publication “Development of numerical models for conjugate heat transfer, phase change and non-condensable gas effects: Validation against single bubble growth in microgravity” has been selected as the December 2025 cover feature of Physics of Fluids.
In the paper, we present the extension of a multiregion, multiphase-capable OpenCFD solver in OpenFOAM for simulating the growth of a single vapor bubble in 0 g microgravity. The core of the work is the improvement of heat and mass transport modeling at the three-phase contact line, along with the consideration of non-condensable gases.
Validation is performed against the ISS-based RUBI (Multiscale Boiling Experiment), which provides high-resolution infrared measurements of the heater surface temperature. The results demonstrate that the new modeling approach enables a significantly more realistic representation of heat and mass transfer. Furthermore, it is shown that even small fractions of dissolved non-condensable gases strongly affect bubble growth by shifting the local saturation temperature and suppressing condensation at the bubble cap. To address this, we introduce a practical correction for the local saturation temperature.
