Development and testing of a universal aerosol conditioner

A general purpose aerosol conditioning device called the Universal Aerosol Conditioner (UAC) has been designed and tested. The device may be used to condition an aerosol in multiple ways: dilute the entire aerosol (gas- and particle-phase), dilute only a gas-phase component of the aerosol without diluting the particle concentration, denude the aerosol by removing semi-volatile material from the particle phase, and humidify or dehumidify an aerosol. The UAC accomplishes these processes by bringing the aerosol into contact with sheath air and allowing enough time for gas-phase components of the aerosol to diffuse into the sheath flow. A model was developed to assess the theoretical performance of the UAC and was solved numerically. From the model it was determined that two parameters dictated the rate of diffusion between the two flows: the Péclet number and the ratio of sheath-to-aerosol flow rates. A prototype was designed and built and the theory of operation was experimentally validated by measuring the particle penetration efficiency and the gas dilution factor at various particle sizes and flow conditions. The results showed that at low aerosol and sheath flows, the prototype behaved closely to the theoretical model but diverged from the theory once the sheath flows were increased, presumably due to mixing between the two flows.Copyright © 2022 American Association for Aerosol Research