An Experimental Investigation of the Two-Phase Couplings between Passive Deformable Objects with Intense Background Turbulence

A persistent theme throughout the study of active and passive particles in turbulence is the need to model and predict the detailed behaviors of all involved phases and the phenomena that they manifest at multiple length and time scales. Although many analytic and empirical models of multiphase flows have been formulated strictly for spherical particles with fixed shapes, in turbulent flows, finite-sized objects can constantly deform with altogether different dynamics and momentum couplings over a wide range of scales. In this talk, I will share some ongoing effort on developing new experimental facilities and techniques to simultaneously measure both the bubble deformation and surrounding turbulent flows in a 3D Lagrangian framework. In particular, I will show how the advanced diagnostic system allows one to uncover the key physics of two-phase couplings that were not possible to measure before in turbulence.