September 26, 2019 – Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative

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Droplets and bubble clouds for waves and slicks of (a) crude oil and (b) oil-dispersant mixture at 1:25 ratio. Individual crude oil droplets and bubbles are discernible in (a). However, the oil-dispersant mixture in (b) forms an opaque cloud with droplets sizes that fall well below the resolution range of the high-speed imaging system. Image credit: The Joseph Katz Lab and author Cheng Li, Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University Postdoc Fellow, Saint Anthony Falls Laboratory, University of Minnesota.

Study Quantifies Dispersant Effects on Initial Oil Slick Breakup by Waves

September 26, 2019

Scientists generated breaking waves in the presence of various dispersant and oil ratios (DOR) using a custom-built wave tank to investigate how subsurface oil droplets evolve in a turbulent environment.