Interactions between soot and CH in a laminar boundary layer type diffusion flame in microgravity

A three-dimensional laminar non-buoyant diffusion flame was studied with the objective of improving the understanding of the soot production. The flame originated from a porous ethylene burner discharging into a laminar boundary layer. Soot volume fractions were measured using Laser-Induced Incandescence (LII) and the spontaneous emission from CH∗ was determined using chemiluminescence. The main parameter varied was the oxidizer flow. CH∗ measurements allowed to identify the reaction zone, while LII measurements permitted the tracking of soot. It was observed that soot volume fractions are inversely proportional to the global residence time. This is in contradiction to previous studies on axi-symmetric non-buoyant diffusion flames. The combined measurements allowed to establish that the apparently contradictory behaviour can be explained by an analysis of the influence of the flow field on the ratio of soot production to oxidation.