Evaluation method for design improvement of bioreactor to prevent biofouling/biofilm
 

Hi Everyone,

I'm fairly new to CFD and my problem is that I have to find a way prevent as good as possible free suspended plant cells from attaching to the inner surface of the transparent bioreactor. I can't post pictures in here, but the reactor is made up of loops with internal baffles intertwined while gas bubbles rise upwards. This generates a rotationary flow. When y-direction of turn negative or when it rotates downwards, it gets slower and loses much of its turbulent kinetic energy. Now I have to alter the design in such manner, that the cells are prevented from settling to the upper side of the baffles by the stream. I'm looking for a way to find an evaluation method make some statement about the near wall surface besides the velocity magnitude... maybe there is a way to analyze the shear rate at the wall surface? Or something else, that helps finding an optimal geometry so cell adherence by settling does not happen...
This is supposed to be done with Ansys 13 and FLUENT.

Any sort of help is appreciated.

Kevin