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Updated: Apr 28, 2026

Simultaneous Measurement of Turbulence and Particle Kinematics Using Flow Imaging Techniques
Published on: March 12, 2019
Turbulent dispersion via fan-generated flows
Siobhan K Halloran1, Anthony S Wexler2, William D Ristenpart1
1Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of California Davis, Davis, California 95616, USA.
Abstract:
Turbulent dispersion of passive scalar quantities has been extensively studied in wind tunnel settings, where the flow is carefully conditioned using flow straighteners and grids. Much less is known about turbulent dispersion in the "unconditioned" flows generated by fans that are ubiquitous in indoor environments, despite the importance of these flows to pathogen and contaminant transport. Here, we demonstrate that a point source of scalars released into an airflow generated by an axial fan yields a plume whose width is invariant with respect to the fan speed. The results point toward a useful simplification in modeling of disease and pollution spread via fan-generated flows.
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