THE CLASSICAL NUCLEATION THEORY AND MODELING OF CAVITATION PROCESSES

The description of the nucleation of bubbles and their growth in cavitation processes suitable for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations is investigated. The number of newly created bubbles and their sizes are treated empirically in most of the numerical codes. We show that the Classical Nucleation Theory (CNT) can be used to calculate the nucleation probabilities in water. Also a simple model of the growth of the nucleated bubbles is described. The CNT predictions of the nucleation rate show promising results and together with the bubble growth model can be used to enhance the precision of CFD modeling of cavitating flows.