CAVITATION AND ITS EFFECT IN

FLUIDS

A Technical Seminar Report

Submitted in partial fulfilment of
the requirement for the B.Tech.
Under Biju Patnaik University of Technology, Rourkela.

Submitted by
Sarthak Das Roll # ME201518114

2018 - 2019

Under the guidance of

Mr. Achyutananada Parida

NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

Palur Hills, Berhampur- 761008, Odisha, India
ABSTRACT

The effect of physical wear and losses in the case of fluid domain has been an
effective criterion to have analysis. Cavitation in a certain way causes the formation
of voids and surface fatigue on the surface of metals that are either exposed as a
passage or as a part of fabrication of external body of submarines, turbines, pumps,
pipes, underwater missiles etc. in cavitation process there is formation and
accumulation of bubbles around the walls of the parts and as these bubbles collapses it
creates a high energy which creates high energy shock waves inside the liquids
causing the erosion of material. In cases of fluidic means of transportation or passages
the wear in materials in engineering context can cause high cost and difficult
serviceability of the parts therefore it is very important to analyse and have a proper
design of the dynamic parts to avoid this undesirable phenomenon. Generally, the
major losses through cavitation only takes place when it is inertial, that is where
continuous formation and collapse of bubbles takes place. However, this can even be
controlled by considering the following steps such as

 Reducing the temperature of fluid.

 Increasing the working depth inside the fluid.
 Maintaining the flow rate and pressure in fluid while using pumps.
 Proper sealing of the vessels.

However, it is sometimes useful and does not cause damage when the bubbles
collapse away from machinery, such as in super cavitation where the effect to create
bubble or vapour is large enough to encompass an object. Even in non-inertial
cavitation the voids formed are used in cleaning purposes.

Therefore, in engineering context specifically in fluids the effect of cavitation has vast
effect that can be as a loss and as a medium to improve the effectiveness in fluid
dynamics.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

i
I give my sincere thanks to Mr. Achyutananda Parida, Seminar Advisor for giving
me the opportunity and motivating us to complete the seminar within stipulated period
of time and providing a helping environment.

I give my sincere thanks to Mr. Asit Kumar Panda, Seminar Coordinator, for
helping me throughout my seminar and encouraging me to complete this seminar.

I acknowledge with immense pleasure the sustained interest, encouraging attitude and
constant inspiration rendered by Prof. Sangram Mudali (Director) & Prof. Geetika
Mudali (Placement Director) N.I.S.T. Their continued drive for better quality in
everything that happens at N.I.S.T. and selfless inspiration has always helped us to
move ahead.

Sarthak Das

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT....................................................................................................................i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT.............................................................................................ii

ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS..............................................................................................iii
LIST OF FIGURES.......................................................................................................iv
1. INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................1
2. DISCOVERY OF CAVITATION EFFECT...............................................................4
3. CLASSIFICATION OF CAVITAITON EFFECT...................................................14
4. FORMATION OF CAVITATION EFFECT...............................................................6
4.1. SIGNIFICANCE OF VAPOR PRESSURE.

4.2. CAVITATION INDEX.

4.3. CAVITATION INCEPTION.

5. ADVERSE EFFECTS OF CAVITATION.................................................................7

5.1. BUBBLE EXPLOSION.

5.2. CAVITATION EFFECT IN PUMPS AND PROPELLERS.

5.3. CAVITATION EFFECT IN SPILLWAYS.

5.4. CAVITATION EFFECT IN ENGINES.

6. APPLICATIONS OF CAVITATION EFFECT........................................................10

6.1. CHEMICAL ENGINEERING.

6.2. BIOMEDICAL.

6.3. SONOLUMINESCENCE.

7. SUPERCAVITATION EFFECT...............................................................................19
7.1 WORKING PRINCIPLE.......................................................................................19
7.2 SUPERCAVITATING TORPEDO.........................................................................19
8 . CONCLUSIONS.....................................................................................................20
REFERENCES.............................................................................................................21

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2.1: The men who toiled hard for GRAPHENE.................................................5

Figure 3.1: Mother of all graphitic forms. Graphene is a 2D building material
for carbon materials of all other dimensionalities. It can be wrapped

iii
 up into 0D buckyballs, rolled into 1D nano tubes or stacked into 3D
graphite.......................................................................................................6
Figure 4.1: Energy Dispersion figure.............................................................................7
Figure 5.1: (a) The device structure of the GNR TFET (b) The energy band
diagram of the TFET under VG = 0 (solid line), high VG (dot line),
and low VG (dashed line)........................................................................10
Figure 5.2: I -V characteristics for N = 13 GNR TFET. Vmin is 0 and 0.1V for
solid and dashed line, respectively............................................................12
Figure 7.1: I -V characteristics for different GNR widths for different N value
as from top to bottom i.e.(N=16,N=13,N=10)..........................................16

iv
1. INTRODUCTION

The word cavity, from which the term cavitation derives, comes from the Latin word cavus,
which means hollow. Cavitation is the occurrence of any small bubbles in a hydraulic system due
to a pressure such that the pressure decrease in the water is less than vapour pressure that are the
consequence of forces acting upon the liquid. When the water pressure is lower than the vapour
pressure, the water vaporises within the liquid and small bubbles are formed. Pressure of the
liquid around the bubbles cause the bubbles to then collapse which releases energy. In a
hydraulic system, cavitation release so much energy that damage and erosion can occur on solid
aspects of the system. We can see the negative results of cavitation in pumps, turbines and dams.
Cavitation is most likely to occur near the fast-moving blades of the turbines and in the exit of
the turbines.
When cavitation occurs, the liquid changes its phase from liquid to vapour at certain flow region
where the liquid pressure is very low due to the high local velocities. There are two types of
vaporisation.
1. The first is the well-known process of vaporisation by increasing temperature(boiling).
2. Vaporisation under nearly constant temperature due to reduced pressure (i.e. cold boiling)
as in the case of cavitation.

The cold boiling process hence the cavitation depends on the purity of water. Purity water can
withstand considerable low pressure without undergoing cavitation. A necessary condition for the
inception of is the presence of weak spots in the water which the break bond between the water
molecules. Cavitation inception from bubble nuclei is an essential phenomenon involved in
cavitation process. The tensile strength of these nuclei depends not only on the water quality, but
also on the pressure-time history of the water. Cavitation effect also applies when there are no
visible bubbles. Sub microscopic gas bubbles can provide suitable nuclei for cavitation purposes.
Hence cavitation can either be vaporous or gaseous perhaps a combination of both.

5
 Fig: Phase diagram (gas, liquid, solid)

Cavitation is usually divided into two classes of behaviour: inertial (or transient) cavitation and
non-inertial cavitation. Inertial cavitation is the process where a void or bubble in a liquid rapidly
collapses, producing a shock wave. Inertial cavitation occurs in nature in the strikes of mantis
shrimps and pistol shrimps, as well as in the vascular tissues of plants. In man-made objects, it
can occur in control valves, pumps, propellers and impellers. On-inertial cavitation is the process
in which a bubble in a fluid is forced to oscillate in size or shape due to some form of energy
input, such as an acoustic field. Such cavitation is often employed in ultrasonic cleaning baths
and can also be observed in pumps, propellers, etc.

For any hydraulic system, cavitation must be taken into consideration both during the design
process as well as after the system is in place. Engineers need to routinely check for cavitation
damage during the life of the system. If cavitation occurs and is not caught quickly colossal
damage can occur. One of the major incidents caused due to cavitation effect was caught in the
year 1974 where there was collapse of tunnel during the construction of Tarbela Dam in
Pakistan. Cavitation erosion is a long-lasting and not well-resolved problem . Even though
cavitation has certain harmful effects with controlled cavitation process its has been continuously
being used in enhancing the chemical reaction, for ultrasonic cleaning baths and in the field of

6
material processing technologies and medical treatment. Prevention of cavitation is essential for
the success and continued operation of any hydraulic system. An outline of this theory, failures
and prevention is detailed in the following report.

7
 2. DISCOVERY OF CAVITATION EFFECT

Although the word ‘cavitation’ was originally coined by R. E. Froude

and first cited by Barnaby and Thornycroft in 1895, the phenomenon
was conjectured much earlier by L. Euler in his theory of water
turbines in 1754. However, actual cavitation was first discovered and
investigated by Barnaby and Parsons in 1893 when they found that the
formation of vapour bubbles on the propeller blades was responsible
for the sea-trial failure in 1885 of a British high-speed warship HMS
Daring. In 1895, Parsons established the first water tunnel for
Fig: Lord Rayleigh cavitation study and discovered the relationship between cavitation
and the damage to the propeller. It was Rayleigh who, in 1917, laid the theoretical foundation for
cavitation study by solving the problem of the collapse of an empty cavity in a large mass of liquid.
Following these pioneering works, it was discovered that these tiny bubbles have a remarkable
ability to focus intense energy and forces and the capacity to erode almost any material in any fluid
machine. Cavitation thus became the focal point of research in turbo-machinery.

While cavitation seemed to properly came into picture in the 19 th century it was
profoundly discovered in the 18th century where it was extensively researched and utilised in the
field of medical sciences. In 1880, the Curie brothers discovered the piezoelectric effect [Curie
and Curie, 1880] which led Paul Langevin to develop one of the first uses of underwater
ultrasound at a frequency of about 150 kHz [Hunt, 1982]. The development of ultrasound and
echo detection advanced and in the 1920s, Boyle and his colleagues were the first to observe
ultrasound-induced gas bubbles forming in liquid, which today is known as cavitation [Boyle
and Lehmann, 1926], [Boyle, 1927], [Boyle and Taylor, 1929]. It has also been discovered that
ultrasound has the ability to produce lesions on the lungs of animals such as pigs, mice, rabbit,
rats, monkeys and dogs. The proposed mechanism of lung damage caused by ultrasound is a
two-step process. The initial step occurs when the lung is first punctured by a mechanical force
such as radiation force. The propagation of the lesion is thought to occur when the air-blood
barrier is disturbed and the air and blood mix and cavitation occurs. The introduction of
microbubbles, from the air and the blood causes cavitation.

8
 LESION

Fig: Rat Lung with an Ultrasound-Induced Lesion

Historically, cavitation noise and damage were considered on the basis of the collapse of
individual bubbles. The importance of the interactions between bubbles is a relatively recent
revelation. In 1997, research shed light on the effects of flow on a single cavitation event. The
progression of events is a rich complexity of micro-fluid mechanics of bubble cavitation, much
of which remains to be understood. The classic Rayleigh-Plesset analysis of a spherical bubble
which follows, could not reproduce some of the phenomena which were observed in actual
laboratory settings. Both Knapp - Hollander and Parkin observed that almost all cavitation
bubbles are closer to hemispherical rather than spherical. Whatever the deviations from the
spherical shape, the fact remains that their collapse is a violent process that produces noise and
the potential for material damage to nearby surfaces. Much attention is given to this point in this
course.

3. FORMATION OF CAVITATION EFFECT

3.1 SIGNIFICANCE OF VAPOUR PRESSURE

9
Vapor pressure is an intensive property of a given substance, which means that the vapor
pressure is independent on the amount of substance. The concentration of a vapor in contact with
its liquid, especially at equilibrium, is often expressed in terms of vapor pressure, which will be
a partial pressure (a part of the total gas pressure) if any other gas(es) are present with the vapor.
The equilibrium vapor pressure of a liquid is in general strongly dependent on temperature. At
vapor–liquid equilibrium, a liquid with individual components in certain concentrations will have
an equilibrium vapor in which the concentrations or partial pressures of the vapor components
have certain values depending on all of the liquid component concentrations and the temperature.
As it depends strongly on temperature, with higher temperatures resulting in increased vapor
pressure. For example, if we heat liquid in a closed container, the vapor pressure keeps
increasing (until the container breaks). The vapor pressure also determines the boiling point of a
liquid at a given external pressure. A liquid boil when its vapor pressure becomes equal to the
external pressure. Under ambient conditions the external pressure corresponds to 1.013 × 105 Pa
(760 torr) and the boiling point in this case is called the standard boiling point. If the pressure is
reduced, the boiling point decreases accordingly.

Significance of vapour pressure in the formation of cavitation can be illustrated by

taking a closed container and through observation of fluid vapour interface we can state that, If
the fluid pressure is more than vapour’s, more` fluid molecules would escape into vapour form.
On the contrary, if the fluid pressure is less than vapour's, the vapour molecules would want to
form a bubble inside the bulk fluid which would aggravate the continuous formation and
explosion of bubbles.

10
 3.2 . Cavitation Index and bubble formation
Cavitation is often confused with the process of boiling, which is a similar phenomenon with
several key differences. During the boiling process, the temperature of water is increased while
maintaining constant external pressure (e.g., an open pot on a stove). As the water begins to
undergo a phase change once the temperature reaches the boiling point, with vapor bubbles
forming and collapsing when they reach the surface. Cavitation is similar in the way that it too
consists of water changing from liquid to vapor state. However, the primary difference is that
boiling occurs by changing the temperature while holding the pressure constant, and cavitation
occurs by changing the pressure while holding the temperature constant.

Like many other phenomena, cavitation comes in a variety of magnitudes and intensities. Vapor
bubbles may vary in size depending on which stage of cavitation the fluid is undergoing. The
size of vapor bubbles is what affects the extent of damage and noise within the system. Two
terms used to describe the progression of the cavitation process are incipient cavitation and
desinent cavitation. The first refers to the critical state when cavitation first begins to occur as

11
velocity increases and pressure reaches the value of the vapor pressure of the fluid. Desinent
cavitation refers to the point at which velocity fluid is reduced and the pressure is greater than
the vapor pressure. Flow can also reach a point of super cavitation, in which a single large
bubble is present as opposed to the numerous individual bubbles. Super cavitation is especially
applicable to the study of the motion of fast-moving objects submerged in a liquid. When a fast-
moving object is submerged in a liquid, a large vapor bubble encompassing the object greatly
reduce the drag and aids its travel. The parameter commonly used to distinguish whether
cavitation will occur and to what level is called the cavitation index, �.

where U∞, p ∞ and T∞ are respectively a reference velocity, pressure and temperature in the flow (usually

upstream quantities), ρL is the liquid density and pV (T∞) is the saturated vapor pressure.

Figure 1. Formation of Cavitation Bubbles

12
 3.3 Cavitation Inception
In a particular flow as σ is reduced, cavitation will first be observed to occur at some
particular value of σ called the incipient cavitation number and denoted by σi. Further re-
duction in σ below σi would cause an increase in the number and size of the vapor bubbles.

Suppose that prior to cavitation inception, the magnitude of the lowest pressure in the
single-phase flow is given by the minimum value of the coefficient of pressure, Cpmin. Note
that Cpmin is a negative number and that its value could be estimated from either experiment
on or calculations of the single-phase flow. Then, if cavitation inception were to occur
when the minimum pressure reaches the vapor pressure it would follow that the value of
the critical inception number, σi, would be simply given by

Unfortunately, many factors can cause the actual values of σi to depart radically from
−Cpmin and much research has been conducted to explore these departures because of the
importance of determining σi accurately. Among the important factors are

1. The ability of the liquid to sustain a tension so that bubbles do not grow to observable size
until the pressure falls a finite amount below the vapor pressure. The magnitude of this
tension is a function of the contamination of the liquid and, in particular, the size and
properties of the microscopic bubbles (cavitation nuclei) that grow to produce the observable
vapor bubbles (see, for example, Billet 1985).
2. The fact the cavitation nuclei require a finite residence time in which to grow to observable
size.
3. The fact that measurements or calculations usually yield a minimum coefficient of
pressure that is a time-averaged value. On the other hand, many of the flows with which
one must deal in practice are turbulent and, therefore, nuclei in the middle of turbulent
eddies may experience pressures below the vapor pressure even when the mean pressure is
greater than the vapor pressure.

13
Moreover, since water tunnel experiments designed to measure σi are often carried out at
considerably reduced scale, it is also critical to know how to scale up these effects to
accurately anticipate inception at the full scale.

The stability phenomenon has important con-sequences in many cavitating flows. To

recognize this, one must visualize a spectrum of sizes of cavitation nuclei being convected
into a region of low pressure within the flow. Then the p∞ in equation will be the local
pressure in the liquid surrounding the bubble, and p∞ must be less than pV for explosive

cavitation growth to occur

14
4. CLASSIFICATION OF CAVITATION

Cavitation phenomenon can be classified into four categories:

A. Hydrodynamic cavitation

This type of cavitation is produced when the pressure in the liquid systems (e.g. ship
propellers, pumps, turbines, hydrofoils and nozzles) drops below the saturated vapor
pressure. For most cases, cavitation can cause severe damage to the
materials and should be avoided in hydraulic machinery. Cavitation will only occur if
the local pressure declines to some point below the saturated vapor pressure of the
liquid and subsequent recovery above the vapor pressure. If the recovery pressure is
not above the vapor pressure then flashing is said to have occurred. In pipe systems,
cavitation typically occurs either as the result of an increase in the kinetic energy
(through an area constriction) or an increase in the pipe elevation. Hydrodynamic
cavitation can be produced by passing a liquid through a constricted channel at a
specific flow velocity or by mechanical rotation of an object through a liquid. In the
case of the constricted channel and based on the specific (or unique) geometry of the
system, the combination of pressure and kinetic energy can create the hydrodynamic
cavitation cavern downstream of the local constriction generating high energy
cavitation bubbles.

Fig: Cavitating vortex in the draft tube of a Francis turbine.

 B. Acoustic cavitation

This type of cavitation refers to the nucleation, growth and collapse of bubbles
under acoustic waves. The cavitation bubbles can be characterized by the dynamics of
oscillations and the maximum temperatures and pressures reached when they
collapse. These aspects can be studied both experimentally and theoretically for a
single bubble system. However, in a multi-bubble system, the formation of bubble
streamers and clusters makes it difficult to characterize the cumulative properties of
these bubbles. This kind of cavitation has boosted many interdisciplinary subjects,
e.g. sonochemistry, sonoluminescence, sonoporation etc. It has been widely used for
kidney stone crush (lithotripsy), gene transfer and non-invasive cancer treatment.

Fig: SEM micrographs of cells after sonoporation and fixation.

C. Optic cavitation

This type of cavitation occurs when the medium is radiated by high-intensity laser pulses.
This novel method of cavitation is called thermocavitation. Light absorbed heats up
the liquid beyond its boiling temperature (spinodal limit) in a time span of microseconds
to milliseconds (depending on the optical intensity). Once the liquid is heated up to its
spinodal limit (∼300 °C for pure water), the superheated water becomes unstable to
random density fluctuations and an explosive phase transition to vapor takes place
producing a fast-expanding vapor bubble. Eventually, the bubble collapses emitting a
strong shock-wave. High speed camera and holography are usually employed to record
the single- or multiple- bubble behaviour induced by later.
Fig: Single vapor bubble dynamics. The movie is taken with 1 million frames/s, and
the image width is 140microns.

D. Particle Cavitation
Besides photons in optic cavitation, other elementary particles (e.g.
protons; neutrinos) can also generate cavitation bubbles. When the high
energy particles pass the mediums, a small fraction of mediums will be ionized
and rapidly heated, resulting in tiny bubbles.
 5. ADVERSE EFFECTS OF CAVITATION
5.1. Bubble Explosion

The mechanics of cavitation bubble collapse when demonstrated in a preliminary way,

vapor or cavitation bubble collapse in the absence of thermal effects can lead to very
large inter-face velocities and very high localized pressures. This violence has important
technological consequences for it can damage nearby solid surfaces in critical ways.
The approximate evaluation of the magnitudes of the velocities, pressures, and
temperatures generated by cavitation bubble collapse under a number of assumptions
including that the bubble remains spherical. Though collapsing bubbles do not
remain spherical, the spherical analysis provides a useful starting point. When a
cavitation bubble grows from a small nucleus to many times its original size, the
collapse will begin at a maximum radius, Rm, with a partial pressure of gas, pGm, that
is very small indeed. In a typical cavitating flow Rm is of the order of 100 times the
original nuclei size, Ro. Consequently, if the original partial pressure of gas in the
nucleus was about 1 bar the value of pGm at the start of collapse would be about 10−6
bar. If the typical pressure depression in the flow yields value of, say, 0.1 bar the
maximum pressure generated would be about 1010 bar and the maximum temperature
would be 4 × 104 times the ambient temperature. Many factors, including the
diffusion of gas from the liquid into the bubble and the effect of liquid
compressibility, mitigate this result.

Figure 5.3. The collapse of a cavitation bubble close to a solid boundary .

5.2. Cavitation in centrifugal pumps and propellers

Within a centrifugal pump, the flow area at the eye of the pump impeller is usually
smaller than either the flow area of the pump suction piping or the flow area through
the impeller vanes. When the liquid being pumped enters the eye of a centrifugal pump,
the decrease in flow area results in an increase in flow velocity accompanied by a
decrease in pressure. The greater the pump flow rate, the greater the pressure drop
between the pump suction and the eye of the impeller. If the pressure drop is large
enough, or if the temperature is high enough, the pressure drop may be sufficient to
cause the liquid to flash to vapor when the local pressure falls below the saturation
pressure for the fluid being pumped. Any vapor bubbles formed by the pressure drop at
the eye of the impeller are swept along the impeller vanes by the flow of the fluid.
When the bubbles enter a region where local pressure is greater than saturation pressure
farther out the impeller vane, the vapor bubbles abruptly collapse. This process of the
formation and subsequent collapse of vapor bubbles in a pump causes cavitation.

Cavitation in a centrifugal pump has a significant effect on pump performance.

Cavitation degrades the performance of a pump, resulting in a fluctuating flow rate
and discharge pressure. Cavitation can also be destructive to pumps internal
components. When a pump cavitates, vapor bubbles form in the low-pressure region
directly behind the rotating impeller vanes. These vapor bubbles then move toward
the oncoming impeller vane, where they collapse and cause a physical shock to the
leading edge of the impeller vane. This physical shock creates small pits on the
leading edge of the impeller vane. Each individual pit is microscopic in size, but the
cumulative effect of millions of these pits formed over a period of hours or days can
literally destroy a pump impeller. Cavitation can also cause excessive pump
vibration, which could damage pump bearings, wearing rings, and seals.

5.3. Cavitation effect in spillways

When water flows over a dam spillway, the irregularities on the spillway surface will
cause small areas of flow separation in a high-speed flow, and, in these regions, the
pressure will be lowered. If the flow velocities are high enough the pressure may fall
to below the local vapor pressure of the water and vapor bubbles will form. When
these are carried downstream into a high-pressure region the bubbles collapse giving
rise to high pressures and possible cavitation damage. Experimental investigations
show that the damage on concrete chute and tunnel spillways can start at clear water
flow velocities of between 12 and 15 m/s, and, up to flow velocities of 20 m/s, it may
be possible to protect the surface by streamlining the boundaries, improving the
surface finishes or using resistant materials. When some air is present in the water the
resulting mixture is compressible and this damps the high pressure caused by the
bubble collapses. If the flow velocities near the spillway invert are sufficiently high,
aerators (or aeration devices) must be introduced to prevent cavitation. Although these
have been installed for some years, the mechanisms of air entrainment at the aerators
and the slow movement of the air away from the spillway surface are still challenging.

5.4. Cavitation effect in Engines

Modern high-speed diesel engines contain cast iron replaceable cylinder liners that are
subject to accelerated corrosion due to a process commonly known as liner pitting. When
plain water is used as a coolant, liners can be penetrated in a matter of 500 hours of
operation when conditions are severe. It Is important to understand the causes of this liner
pitting and how to prevent it. Cylinder liners are installed in a press fit with the engine
block. Gaskets, called crevice seals, are used to seal the lube oil system from the cooling
system across the liner. The pistons strike the liners as they travel up and down due to the
side thrust imparted by the connecting rods as the power is translated from the linear up
and down motion of the piston to the rotary motion of the crankshaft. The clearance
between the piston and the liner and the liner and the block allow this pistons lap to be
translated into a high frequency vibration, much like the vibration of a bell when it is
struck. The side of the liner in contact with the coolant moves first toward the coolant and
then away from it. This rapid movement can cause small vapours bubbles to form as the
liner moves away, and to collapse or implode as the liner moves back. Very large forces are
generated in very small areas as this happens. This is causes cavitation effect in the walls of
cylinder.

Fig: Liner pitting caused due to imploding vapour bubbles

6. APPLICATION OF CAVITATION EFFECT

6.1 Chemical Engineering

In industry, cavitation is often used to homogenize, or mix and break down,

suspended particles in a colloidal liquid compound such as paint mixtures or milk.
Many industrial mixing machines are based upon this design principle. It is usually
achieved through impeller design or by forcing the mixture through an annular
opening that has a narrow entrance orifice with a much larger exit orifice. In the latter
case, the drastic decrease in pressure as the liquid accelerates into a larger volume
induces cavitation. This method can be controlled with hydraulic devices that control
inlet orifice size, allowing for dynamic adjustment during the process, or modification
for different substances. The surface of this type of mixing valve, against which
surface the cavitation bubbles are driven causing their implosion, undergoes
tremendous mechanical and thermal localized stress; they are therefore often
constructed of super-hard or tough materials such as stainless steel, Stellite, or
even polycrystalline diamond (PCD).

Cavitating water purification devices have also been designed, in which the extreme
conditions of cavitation can break down pollutants and organic molecules.

6.2 Biomedical

Cavitation plays an important role for the destruction of kidney stones in shock wave
lithotripsy. Currently, tests are being conducted as to whether cavitation can be used to
transfer large molecules into biological cells (sonoporation). Nitrogen cavitation is a
method used in research to lyse cell membranes while leaving organelles intact.

Cavitation plays a key role in non-thermal, non-invasive fractionation of tissue for

treatment of a variety of diseases and can be used to open the blood-brain barrier to
increase uptake of neurological drugs in the brain.

Cavitation also plays a role in HIFU, a thermal non-invasive treatment methodology

for cancer.
Ultrasound sometimes is used to increase bone formation, for instance in post-surgical
applications. Ultrasound treatments or exposure can create cavitation that potentially
may "result in a syndrome involving manifestations of nausea, headache, tinnitus,
pain, dizziness, and fatigue.".

It has been suggested that the sound of "cracking" knuckles derives from the collapse
of cavitation in the synovial fluid within the joint. Movements that cause cracking
expand the joint space, thus reducing pressure to the point of cavitation. It remains
controversial whether this is associated with clinically significant joint injury such as
osteoarthritis. Some physicians say that osteoarthritis is caused by cracking knuckles
regularly, as this causes wear and tear and may cause the bone to weaken. The
implication being that, it is not the "bubbles popping," but rather, the bones rubbing
together, that causes osteoarthritis.

6.3.
7. VARIABILITY IN GNR TFETs

Variability is expected to play an important role in Graphene electronics in practice.

Variability can come from the difficulty to control GNR width, doping levels in
source and drain, insulator thickness and so on. Our atomistic NEGF simulation of a
wide variety of variability mechanisms have identified the important role of the GNR
width variation and contact doping level variation of GNR TFETs, which are the
subject of this study. Other defect and variability mechanisms exist and should be
explored in future studies, but we expect the effects are qualitatively similar and can
be explored by readily extending the current simulation framework.

7.1 GNR width variation

The band-gap of the GNR is determined by the GNR width. Because device
characteristics are very sensitive to the band-gap of channel material, GNR width is
critical to GNR TFET performance. GNR width is proportional to the GNR index.
GNRs with an index of N =3q and N =(3q+1) are semiconducting GNRs and may be
used as FET channels. Our atomistic NEGF simulation has indicated that N =3q
GNRs have a much smaller subthreshold swing than N =(3q+1) GNRs, so only GNRs
with index values of 10, 13 and 16 were selected to study the effect of variations in
width. Starting with the minimum GNR index of N =10, which has a width of 1.6nm,
the index is increased in steps of 3, or equivalently, by an incremental width of 3.7A˚.

Figure 7.1 illustrates how variability in GNR width affects device IDS-VGS
characteristics. For N =(3q+1) GNRs, the band-gap is in general inversely
proportional to the width of the GNR. Hence, as the width of the GNR increases, the
band-gap decreases, allowing more electrons to enter the conduction band and more
holes to enter the valence band, increasing both the ‘on’ and ‘off’ current. Note that
the current almost remains the same from VGS = −0.2V = 0.2V for the N =10 GNR,
which is due to the direct source-drain tunnelling current discussed before.
 10−5

10−10

10−15

−20
10 −0. −0. 0.
−0.4 −0.3 2 1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 4

Figure 7.1: I -V characteristics for different GNR widths for different N value as from top to bottom i.e.
(N=16,N=13,N=10)

7.2 Doping variation

So far we have assumed that the doping levels at both source and drain can be
precisely controlled, and before we have described the usage of asymmetric doping as
a method to suppress ambipolar conduction. However, under process variations, it is
very difficult to have both contacts accurately doped to a desired level, and the
variation of doping levels may result in performance degradation. As presented in
earlier, the doping level of source and drain have significant influences on electron
and hole current respectively, so if a TFET used as an n-type transistor suffers from
source doping variations, or a TFET used as a p-type transistor suffers from drain
doping variations, the current behaviour will be severely impacted. Note that for GNR
TFETs used as p-type transistors, the drain is usually considered to be the p-doped
contact, i.e., the source of the n-type transistors. Based upon this convention, we
determine that doping variation at source side will influence both the p-type and n-
type transistors’ behaviour, whereas drain side doping variations have negligible effect
for the TFETs considered here with minimum conduction point Vmin = 0. In our
simulations, we fix the doping level at the drain to be 0.01 dopant per atom and vary
that at the source to be 0.01 or 0.004 dopant per atom, and the results for the doping
variations in n-doped region is shown in Figure 6.
8. VARIABILITY IN GNR TFET CIRCUITS

In this section we study the effect of variations in GNR width and doping levels on
the inverter delay, power, and noise robustness. The operating supply voltage VDD =
0.4V is assumed to simulate all the GNR TFET circuits in this section, and the
simulations were performed for an inverter with a fanout-of-4 load. Details on how
we incorporate variations into our circuit simulation model can be found.

8.1 Width variation

The delay, power, and noise margin due to independent variations in GNR widths in
both the n-type and p-type TFETs of an inverter. The delay of an inverter driving a
fanout-of-4 load, with nominal n-type and p-type TFETs (N =13 GNR channel) is
216ps. As GNR width of both n-type and p-type TFETs decreases to N =10, the delay
increases to 19.6ns, showing 2 orders of magnitude increase. On the other hand, if
GNR width of all TFETs increases to N =16, the delay decreases to 62.4ps. As the
GNR gets wider, the rate of increase of the ‘on’ current becomes slower. Therefore,
downscaling the width of GNR will have a larger impact on the circuit delay.

The static power of the inverter is also significantly impacted by the variations in
GNR width, while the dynamic power is relatively less affected. For a nominal
inverter where all the GNRs are N =13, the static power is 1.29aW. When GNR width
decreases to N =10 and increases to N =16, the static power decreases by 1 order of
magnitude and increases by 8 orders of magnitude, respectively. This is due to the
significant impact of GNR width on the ‘off’ current of the TFET. Here it has been
shown that, the static power exhibits the largest influence due to the variation of GNR
width.

Finally, it is observed that the noise margin of the inverter is also impacted by an
order of magnitude in the worst case. In contrast to the delay and power figures of
merit, the noise margin is not greatly affected when the n-type and p-type TFETs of an
inverter have the same widths. For instance, the static noise margin almost remains
the same for N =10, N =13 and N =16 GNR TFETs, with a difference of only 4.5%.
However, when n-type and p-type TFETs have different widths, the influence
becomes significantly larger and reaches the worst-case deviation when there is
maximum mismatch of N =10 and N =16. In this case, the ‘off’ current of N =16
TFET is only one order of magnitude lower than the ‘on’ current of N =10 TFET,
therefore the static noise margin is significantly lowered to 8mV from the nominal
value of 180mV.

8.2 Doping variation

The delay, power, and noise margin due to doping variations that affect the GNRs in
either the n-type and p-type TFET of an inverter. We have discussed earlier, doping
variations at drain side will not affect the performance of p-type and n-type TFETs,
therefore only variations at source side is considered here. In our simulation, the drain
doping level is fixed at 0.01 dopant per atom, and the source doping level is varied
between 0.004 and 0.01 dopant per atom.

Inverter delay is degraded by one order of magnitude when the source doping level of
all TFETs is changed from 0.01 dopant per atom to 0.004 dopant per atom, due to the
altered current behaviour resulting from the decrease in doping. For the same reason,
the static power increases by 20%, and the dynamic energy increases by 6.9%.

The noise margin is significantly affected by the doping variations. Even for the same
doping variations for n-type and p-type TFETs, the SNM is reduced to 21mV, as
compared to the nominal case of 180mV. If only p-type or n-type TFETs suffer from
doping variations, the SNM is further reduced to 18mV.
9. ADVANTAGE AND LIMITATIONS OF
GRAPHENE

9.1 Major advantages of Graphene

 It is the thinnest material known and with that also the strongest.
 It consists of a single layer of carbon atoms and is both pliable and
transparent.
 It is a superb conductor of both heat and electricity.
 It is used in the production of high speed electronic devices
responsible for fast technological changes.
 Chemical sensors effective at detecting explosives.
 Transistors that operate at higher frequency as compared to others.
 It has led to the production of lower costs of display screens in
mobile devices by replacing indium-based electrodes which also lower
power consumption.

9.2 Major disadvantages of Graphene

 Being a great conductor of electricity, although it doesn’t have a band

gap (can’t be switched off). Scientists are working on rectifying this.
 The main disadvantage of Graphene as a catalyst is its susceptibility to
oxidative environments.
 Research has proven that Graphene exhibits some toxic qualities. Scientists
discovered that Graphene features jagged edges that can easily pierce
cell membranes, allowing it to enter into the cell and disrupt normal
functions.
CONCLUSION

This report assessed the viability of Graphene-based tunneling FETs for low-power
applications based on a bottom-up multi-scale framework that treats atomistic scale
features. It was demonstrated that GNR TFET circuits promise extremely low power
consumption compared to conventional CMOS, and also offer comparable speed and
high noise margins. GNRs, the band-gap is in general inversely proportional to the
width of the GNR. Hence, as the width of the GNR increases, the band-gap decreases,
allowing more electrons to enter the conduction band and more holes to enter the
valence band, increasing both the ‘on’ and ‘off’ current. We also motivated the need to
consider the effects of parameter variations in GNR width and contact doping that
affect circuit delay, static power, and noise margin. This assessment of the effects of
variability and parasitics indicate their important role in circuit performance and
design optimization for future Graphene-based TFETs.

Upon increasing the dielectric constant : Both electron and hole mobilities increase a
few orders of magnitude. The width of the conductivity minimum decreases sharply
and approaches zero in high κ solvents. The position of minimum conductivity tend to
shifts positively . The minimum conductivity value decreases from 18 to 3.5 . The
conductivity saturation occurs at lower carrier densities , and the short range
conductivity changes little
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