Effect of Electrostatic Charge on the Deposition of Monodisperse Uniformly Charged Particles in Idealized Extrathoracic Airway of an Adult, Child and Infant

• Author / Creator

  Azhdarzadeh, Mehdi

• An in vitro study was performed on the effect of electrostatic charge on the deposition of monodisperse uniformly charged particles in the extrathoracic airway. An atomizer was designed and prototyped to generate particles using controlled Plateau-Rayleigh breakup, and charge via induction. Experiments were conducted in three phases for adult oral-extrathoracic, child oral-extrathoracic (children aged 6-14 years), and infant nasal-extrathoracic (infants aged 3-18 months) airways.
  
  For the adult case, the Alberta idealized mouth-throat was used to mimic the oral-extrathoracic airway. Experiments covered particles with aerodynamic diameters of 3-6 μm, at flow rates of 15-30 L/min and charge per particle range of 0-25,000 e.
  Tests for the deposition of particles in the child oral-extrathoracic airway were conducted using the Alberta idealized child mouth-throat and particles having aerodynamic diameters of 3-6 μm. Volume flow rate of inhaled gas was set to 10-20 L/min and charge of particles was in the range of 0-10,000 e per particle.
  The Alberta idealized infant nose-throat model was utilized for the infant case, while aerodynamic diameters of particles were 3-6 μm at flow rates of 7.5-15 L/min and the charge level of particles varying between 0-10,000 e/particle.
  The conductive version of the replicas was utilized to avoid any repulsion between the charge of the particles accumulated on the internal walls of the airway and the aerosol particles passing through the airway.
  For each case, nonlinear least squares minimization was used to develop a different empirical equation, including electrostatic effects for predicting the deposition of particles in the airway.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Particle deposition
  • Extrathoracic airway
  • Electrostatic charge

• Graduation date

  Fall 2014

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Doctor of Philosophy

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3M61BW8J

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.