Dendritic Pattern Formation and Contact Line Forces during Dewetting of Dilute Polymer Solutions on a Hydrophobic Surface

The micro-scale morphology of the receding contact line of dilute polyethylene oxide solution drops (c ∼ 100 ppm) after impact and inertial spreading on a fluorinated hydrophobic surface is investigated. One can observe the formation of transient liquid filaments and dendritic structures that evolve into a bead-on-a-string structure similar to the well-known capillary breakup mechanism of dilute polymer solutions, which confirm the interaction between stetched polymer coils and the receding three-phase contact line. The estimation of the average polymer force per unit contact line lenght provides a quantitative explanation for the reduction of the contact line retraction velocity reduction observed experimentally.

Extensional Magnetorheology of Viscoelastic Human Blood Analogues Loaded with Magnetic Particles

This study represents a pioneering work on the extensional magnetorheological properties of human blood analogue fluids loaded with magnetic microparticles. Dynabeads M-270 particles were dispersed in Newtonian and viscoelastic blood analogue fluids at 5% wt. Capillary breakup experiments were performed, with and without the influence of an external magnetic field aligned with the flow direction. The presence of the particles increased the viscosity of the fluid, and that increment was larger when embedded within a polymeric matrix. The application of an external magnetic field led to an even larger increment of the viscosity of the working fluids, as the formation of small aggregates induced an increment in the effective volume fraction of particles. Regarding the liquid bridge stability, the Newtonian blood analogue fluid remained as a Newtonian liquid exhibiting a pinch-off at the breakup time in any circumstance. However, in the case of the viscoelastic blood analogue fluid, the presence of the particles and the simultaneous application of the magnetic field enhanced the formation of the beads-on-a-string structure, as the Ohnesorge number remained basically unaltered, whereas the time of the experiment increased due to its larger viscosity, which resulted in a decrease in the Deborah Number. This result was confirmed with fluids containing larger concentrations of xanthan gum.

Pressure Transient Analysis of Wells in the Fault-Karst Carbonate Reservoirs with Vertical Beads-on-String Structure: Case Studies in Shunbei Oilfield, Tarim Basin of Northwestern China

The newly discovered the fault-karst carbonate reservoirs in Tarim Basin are formed by large-scale tectonic fault activities and multiple-stage karstification. The ground outcrop, seismic reflection and well logging show that the large caves, vugs, tectonic fractures and matrix coexist in the reservoirs. The fractures interconnecting with caves in series to form vertical beads-on-string structure is the most common pattern. It is found that conventional models are difficult to match the recorded pressure data. To fill this gap, this work summarizes three kinds of patterns for this structure and presents three novel models to estimate formation properties. The physical models of multi-fracture-region multi-cave-region series connection are established by simplifying vertical beads-on-string structure. The corresponding mathematical models are developed, in which the flow in fracture regions obey Darcy's law, while the flow in cave regions obeys free flow. Importantly, the gravity is considered due to the flow along vertical direction. Then typical flow regimes are analyzed and sensitivity analysis is conducted. Our work shows that pressure-derivative curves show similar ‘concave’ characteristic for the cave storage regime and vug/matrix interporosity flow regime. The difference is that the pressure derivative for cave storage regime is unit slope, while this slope is not equal to unity for vug/matrix interporosity flow regime. Therefore, large cave and vug/matrix medium can be distinguished by slope of pressure derivative. More than that, the typical characteristic of vertical beads-on-string structure on type curve is that the cave storage regimes and linear flow regimes alternately appear. This characteristic helps the engineers identify vertical beads-on-string structure. A novel finding is that gravity effect could lead to unit-slope pressure and pressure derivative at late times, which is traditional recognized as the presence of a closed boundary when it may not be the case. Lastly, this methodology is applied to two cases from Shunbei Oilfield in which it is difficult to obtain good fitting quality and interpretation results using traditional methods. Besides conventional properties, the proposed methodology allows us to estimate other properties (e.g., cave height, cave radius), which are not readily obtained from conventional methods.

Dynamics of a viscoelastic thread surrounded by a Newtonian viscous fluid inside a cylindrical tube

A viscoelastic thread in vacuum is known to evolve into a beads-on-a-string structure at large deformations. If the thread is immersed in another fluid, the surrounding medium may influence the topological structure of it, which remains unexplored. To get some insights into the nonlinear behaviour of a viscoelastic thread in a two-phase flow system, a one-dimensional model is developed under the slender body approximation, in which the thread of a highly viscoelastic fluid described by the Oldroyd-B or Giesekus constitutive equation is immersed in a Newtonian viscous fluid of much smaller density and viscosity inside a cylindrical tube. The effect of the outer viscous fluid layer and the confinement of the tube is examined. It is found that the outer fluid may change substantially the beads-on-a-string structure of the viscoelastic thread. Particularly, it may induce the formation of secondary droplets on the filament between adjacent primary droplets, even for large wavenumbers. The outer fluid exerts a resistance force on the extensional flow in the filament, but the necking of the thread is slightly accelerated, due to the redistribution of capillary and elastic forces along the filament accompanied by the formation of secondary droplets. Decreasing the tube radius leads to an increase in secondary droplet size but affects little the morphology of the thread. The non-uniformity of the filament between droplets is more pronounced for a Giesekus viscoelastic thread, and pinch-off of a Giesekus thread always occurs in the neck region connecting the filament to the primary droplet in the presence of the outer viscous fluid.

A RESONANCE-BASED THROUGH-TUBING CEMENT EVALUATION TECHNOLOGY

Through tubing cement evaluation in a multi-string well has been considered as a cost-efficient way for well integrity evaluation without removing the production tubing. Conventional acoustic cement bond logging methods are not able to operate accurately with the multi-string structure due to an extremely low sensitivity and Signal-to-Noise (SNR) ratio. Therefore, it is important to develop novel technology and apparatus that can accurately and efficiently monitor the cement condition in the multi-pipe cased well. Applications would include use in production, injection, and storage well configurations as well as for plug and abandonment planning. To this end, a novel through-tubing cement evaluation technology based on a Selective Non-Harmonic Resonance (SNHR) is proposed. Unlike the traditional acoustic wave propagation method (WPM), the new tool emits continuous energy to excites the SNHR of the multi-string structure, considered to be a multi-degree of freedom Duffing system. This includes coupling of the hydraulic pressure in fluid and elastic stress-strain of solid materials. The continuous sinusoidal excitation from the SNHR tool drives the structure in a long burst mode and measures the resonance power loss due to the energy leaking through the cement layer, to represent the casing-cement bond, as well as cement-formation bond condition. The SNHR tool, therefore, has overcome the main challenge, which is the acoustic energy reflections and dissipation through multiple interfaces for existing WPMs. The SNHR tool was validated theoretically and experimentally. Results showed that the SNHR tool can reach high sensitivity (> 10%) and SNR (>10 dB) for variable combinations of pipe sizes up to 14”. This implies that the SNHR is a promising technique for evaluating cement bond integrity in the annulus of an outer-most pipe string when multiple inner pipes and their associated annuli are liquid-filled. In addition, the SNHR tool does not require direct coupling to the first pipe string through pads or extensions, which reduces the engineering complexity of a field-worthy instrument.