PopulationBalance Modeling of Barium Sulfate NanoparticleSynthesis via Inverse Microemulsion Including Coagulation Effect.

A deterministic model based on thediscrete population balanceequation (PBE) is used to examine the precipitation of barium sulfatenanoparticles in nonionic inverse microemulsion systems. It is shownthat coagulation can have a significant effect at low initial reactantsconcentration. The simulation results show that a bimodal particlesize distribution (PSD) observed in experimental analysis reportedin the literature cannot be predicted by neglecting the coagulationeffect. A coagulation kernel is proposed that takes into account theeffect of interparticle forces through the Fuchs’ stabilityratio. The effect of electrolyte concentration on the surfactant headgrouparea is also investigated. It is shown that at lower electrolyte concentration,the nucleation and growth rates increase because of higher interdropletexchange rate. The simulation results show a qualitatively good agreementwith experimental data regarding PSD prediction and dynamic evolutionof mean particle diameter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]