In order to address how human foot movement causes particles to be resuspended from the floor, particle flow visualization and particle image velocimetry (PIV) measurements were performed on a simplified model of the human walking motion; a disk moving normal to the floor. Flow visualization of particles, seeded initially on the ground, indicates that particles are resuspended by both the downward and upward motions of the walking process. On both the upstep and the downstep, particle resuspension occurs due to a high velocity wall jet, forming between the wall and the disk in general accord with the mechanism for particle resuspension put forth by Khalifa and Elhadidi (2007, “Particle Levitation Due to a Uniformly Descending Flat Object,” Aerosol Sci. Technol., 41, pp. 33–42). Large-scale ring vortex structures were formed on both the downstep and the upstep, and did not cause particle resuspension, but were extremely effective at quickly moving the already resuspended particles away from the wall. By varying the seeding of the particles, it was determined that only particles underneath and toward the outer edge of the disk are resuspended.
Experimental study of the human walking-induced fine and ultrafine particle resuspension in a test chamber