HISTORY OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF US PATENT 8,391,552

Method of Particle Trajectory Recognition
in Particle Flows of High Particle Concentration
using a Candidate Trajectory Tree Process with Variable Search Areas

Inventor: Franklin D. Shaffer

USDOE Patent Attorneys: James B. Potts, Mark P. Dvorscak and John T. Lucas

This report describes the huge investment in funds (millions of US taxpayer dollars), the huge investment engineering time (more than 20 years of engineering time), and the largest lab in the USDOE with access to nuclear weapons technologies that went into the development of the technology that would become US Patent 8,391,552 in 2013. 

Development of the technology that would become 8,391,552 began in the late 1980’s in the Particle Flow Analysis Laboratory at the US Department of Energy’s Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center.  The Particle Flow Analysis Lab was the largest laboratory at the USDOE Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center (and likely the largest lab in the world for the study of multiphase flows).  It was in the “High Bay” of Building 84, the Analytical Chemistry Building.  It was in operation from 1988 through 2007.

Wind tunnel of the Particle Flow Research Laboratory, in operation from 1988 through 2007

Particle Tracking Velocimetry (PTV) requires particles to be exposed (illuminated) many times along their trajectories as they pass through the view of a camera.  In the late 1980’s, pulsed illumination sources with (1) repetition rates high enough, (2) pulse energies high enough to expose the silver halide film of high-speed cameras of that timewith scattered light from small (<100 m)refractive or reflective particles, and (3) pulse durations short enough (<100 sec) to freeze the motion of saidparticles had not yet been developed.

At that time, to produce high-resolution velocity maps of particle flow fields, the only option was to use two high-powered pulsed lasers, e.g., Q-switched Rudy or Nd:Yag lasers, to double expose a large-format silver halide film plate.  The name for that technology was coined by Ronald Adrian and Thermo Systems Inc (TSI) as “Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV).” 

If the Stokes number of the particles is <<1, the particles accurately follow the gas or fluid flow.  In this case, the velocity of the gas or fluid flow is measured.

The photo below on the left shows my large format Sinar F2 camera on the viewing port of the wind tunnel in my Particle Flow Analysis Laboratory . The photo on the right shows the large format film plates for the Sinar F2.  We used both 4” x 5” and 8” x 10” film plates.  We had our own dark room to develop the large format film. 

Sinar F2 large format film camera on the viewing port of the wind tunnel of the Particle Flow Analysis Lab.

The 4” x 5” and 8” x 10” large format
film screens of the Sinar F2

One of the first high-speed cameras that we used for PTV was the Kodak Spin Physics SP2000.  To my knowledge, the SP2000 was the first high-speed camera to have a digital photo-electric image sensor.  The data from the photo-electric image sensor was recorded on magnetic film.  To my knowledge, the SP2000 was also the first high-speed camera with rudimentary digital motion analysis tools.   This enabled PTV, albeit in a very laborious manner.  The resolution of the SP2000’s image sensor was 192 x 240 pixels (picture elements).  In 1988, the DOE Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center purchased a Kodak Spin Physic SP2000 high speed camera for $250,000 ($700,000 in 2023 dollars). 

The Kodak SP2000 had a washing machine sized console.  In total, the Kodak SP2000 Motion Analysis System weighed 300 lbs.  The magnetic film cassette of the +SP2000 had to be mailed to Kodak for processing.  The turnaround time was one month.

The SP2000’s 20” x 20” x 40” console.

SP2000 Motion Analysis System

Magnetic film cassette of the SP2000.

For our first work to develop PTV, we used Xenon strobe lights and acousto optically modulated Argon lasers. 

+To the right is a screen shot of our first attempt at digital PTV in 1988 with the SP2000.  It is the first digital PTV I’m aware of.  The screen shows the multiple-exposure of droplets along their trajectories near the film-droplet interface of a J22 fuel spray nozzle. The frame rate was 2000 per second. The pulsed illumination source was an acousto optically modulated Argon laser. The pulse rate was 300 kHz with one microsecond pulse durations.

Photo of the Kodak SP2000 screen showing PTV of droplets near the film-droplet interface of a J22 fuel nozzle.

Nomenclature of what would become US Patent 8,391,552

In the late 1980’s, the name “Particle Tracking Velocimetry” had not yet been coined.  In 1988, this engineer and a PhD Nuclear Engineer, Dr. Everett Ramer, used the name “Pulsed Laser Velocimetry (PLV)” in our paper at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) First National Fluid Dynamics Conference: Development of Pulsed Laser Velocimetry Systems with Photo-Electric Image Sensors  

In+ 1992, we used the name “Multiple Pulse Particle Image Velocimetry (MMPIV) ” in our paper Automated Analysis of Multiple Pulse Particle Image Velocimetry Data in the Journal of Applied Optics, Volume 31, Issue 6.

My Abraham Lincoln Atomic Vapor Laser for PTV

In 1988 were able to procure a copper-vapor laser as a pulsed-illumination source.  Our copper-vapor laser was built the engineers who built them for the DOE Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL).  Copper-vapor lasers are also known as “Atomic Vapor Lasers” because they are used to “pump” dye lasers in the Atomic Vapor Isotope Separation (AVLIS) process to enrich uranium to weapons grade plutonium.  To the knowledge of this author, this was the first AVL from Los Alamos used strictly for civilian applications, namely, Particle Tracking Velocimetry (PTV) and flow visualization.

I called it “my Abraham Lincoln Laser” because in the late 1980’s it was easy to find Li+ncoln pennies were nearly pure copper (pre 1983).  I’d drop a Lincoln penny in my ALL, and out would come the power to protect our country with nuclear weapons.

Abednego Soita, now an Electrical Engineer with JGL, building advanced vehicles for the US military.

When my family “adopted” a 16-year-old kid from Kenya, the first place my brother took him to was the Lincoln Monument.  Or father, Reverend Dr. Dallas B. Shaffer, was a Civil War historian.  His PhD dissertation was on Lincoln wielding the sword of the Union Army to slice Virginia in half, to make a more perfect union, the United States of America.  Click here for my father’s publications, including “Lincoln and the Vast Question of West Virginia”

The green (511 nm) and yellow (578 nm) beams of my Atomic Vapor Laser.

Atomic vapor laser and wind-tunnel of the
Particle Flow Research Laboratory.

Because Atomic Vapor Lasers are a technology used to develop nuclear weapons technology, my procurement and use of an AVL had to be approved by the Fifth Secretary of Energy John S. Herrington, a former Assistant Secretary of the Navy.  In 1992, the Sixth Secretary of Energy Four Star Admiral James D. Watkins, former Chief of Naval Operations and Commander of the Pacific Fleet visited my lab to see my work with the Atomic Vapor Laser.

Streakline Visualization System with an Atomic Vapor Laser

The streakline flow visualization system for the wind tunnel is shown below on the left.  Streaklines over a circular cylinder illuminated by the Atomic Vapor Laser are shown on the right.  A Dage MTI 81 camera was used.  It had a phosphorus cathode image sensor with 2000 analog scan lines.  The analog signal was digitized at a resolution of 2000 x 2000 pixels with an Androx Analog-to-Digital Convertor in a Sun 670 workstation.  It was custom built by engineers at the CMU Robotics Institute.

Custom streakline visualization system for the wind tunnel of the Particle Flow Analysis Lab.

Streaklines illuminated with our Atomic Vapor Laser. A Dage MTI-81 camera is shown.

Electromagnetic Radio Frequency (EMI/RFI) Noise from the Atomic Vapor Laser creating the Appearance of a High Concentration Particle Flow Field

The large capacitors of the AVL had to charge and discharge 10,000 times per second.   The capacitors were discharged in less than 50 nanoseconds.  This generated very high levels of Electromagnetic Radio Frequency (EMI/RFI) noise.  The EMI/RFI noise showed up on the photo-electric image sensors of cameras as horizontal lines and dots, as shown below.  The photo below on the left shows the trajectories of three particles recorded on a Dage MTI-81 camera, one colliding with a cylinder.  The camera frame is overlain with the EMI/RFI noise pulses from the Atomic Vapor Laser.

The EMI/RFI noise also showed up on every spectrometer in the Analytical Chemistry Building.  In an effort to try to shield and ground the EMI/RFI noise, Dr. Richard Sprecher, a PhD Chemist from CMU, and an inventor of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging (NMRI) technologies , helped me design a Faraday cage to enclose the AVL (shown below on the right). It was made of a ½” thick copper screen (a double layer of ¼” thick copper screen).  It was able to shield the EMI/RFI enough for spectrometers to work, but the EMI/RFI noise still showed up on the image sensors of the photoelectric cameras used in the Particle Flow Analysis Laboratory. 

A camera frame showing the trajectories of three particles overlain with EMI/RFI noise from the Atomic Vapor Laser.

Faraday cage enclosing the Atomic Vapor Laser, designed by Dr. Richard Sprecher.

Although the particle flows being studied at that time were at low particle concentrations, the EMI/RFI noise from the Atomic Vapor Laser produced artificial “particle” images.  This made the flow field appear as a particle flow with very high particle co+ncentrations.  This was the reason driving the initial development of algorithms for high concentration PTV (hcPTV).

To develop particle tracking algorithms that could discern between real particle images and the artificial EMI/RFI noise "particles," Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations of particle flows at low particle concentrations were created, then artificial noise particles were added at increasing concentrations. The concentration of noise particles was gradually increased until the image was filled with them.

CFD simulation of particles flowing over and colliding with a circular cylinder.

Trajectories identified in a CFD simulation with very high concentrations of added noise particles.

The code that implemented the particle tracking algorithms that I developed with Dr. Ramer was written by Ramakrishna Srinivan and Ramanand Singh.  Both have Master’s Degrees in Computer Engineering.  Here’s a link to their original code in C language, called “Trajectory Formation.”   It is ~1500 lines of C+ code.

We tested many types of pulse coding schemes for hcPTV.  We describe and  evaluation of them in our papers Analysis of Pulse-Coded Particle Tracking Velocimetry Data , by Ramakrishna Srinivasan, Ramanand Singh Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), and Franklin Shaffer, USDOE Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center, IEEE International Conference on Pattern Recognition, Copenhagen, Denmark, September 1991, and “ Fluorescent Image Tracking Velocimetry algorithms for quantitative flow analysis in artificial organ devices ,” by Ramanand Singh, Franklin Shaffer, and Harvey Borovetz, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Artificial Heart Program, in the peer-reviewed Journal of the International Society for Optics and Photonics, SPIE, Volume 1905, pages 281-292, 1993 .

PTV algorithms were developed and tested for three pulse-coding schemes — a single-pulse code, a dash-dot pulse code, and a constant-frequency pulse code.  The algorithms were tested on flow fields in three types of artificial cardiac organs: the Baxter Healthcare Novacor Left Ventricular Assist System, the Nimbus AxiPump, and the Hattler Intravenous Membrane Oxygenator.  A constant-frequency pulse coding scheme was found to provide superior results for these applications, despite the drawback of time-direction ambiguity.

In 1994, I planned to make the PTV system commercially available.  It would use an Atomic Vapor Laser and software for PTV using the algorithms I developed with Dr. Ramer.  SAIC agreed to fund the commercialization.  Here’s a link to the proposal I wrote for SAIC.   Unfortunately I had to abandon the commercialization effort because it would require that I travel throughout the US and Europe. 

On September 8, 1994, Flight 427 went down on its approach to Pittsburgh International Airport.  Five engineers from the Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center went down with 427. 

On September 8, 1994, I was visiting friends near Monaca, PA.  Suddenly the entire region was suddenly filled with the sound of sirens and lights from first responders.  I thought there’d been an accident at the nearby Shippingport Atomic Power Station.  It was the crash of Flight 427. 

I knew all five engineers who went down on 427.  Dr. Bill Peters funded my research on high concentration particle flows. I played tennis with Tom Arrigoni.  Tim McIlvried, a fuel scientist from Penn State, was in the office beside mine in Building 84.  He was my age, 32.  I went to five funerals in a week.  I’ve had trouble flying since then.  I simply could not do the travel required to market the PTV system. 

Below is a list of my publications on the development and application of high concentration Particle Tracking Velocimetry (hcPTV ).  

1

1985

The Intensively Circulating Fluidized Bed , Franklin Shaffer and Richard Bajura, Annual Report of the National Science Foundation West Virginia University Fluid-Particle Science Research Center

2

1987

Fundamental Aspects of Gas-Particle Transport, Franklin Shaffer, Proceedings of the DOE Solids Transport Program Review Meeting, Pittsburgh, PA

3

1987

Flow Mechanics of Ash Deposition, Franklin Shaffer, George Klinzing, Mahendra Mathur, James Ekmann Pneumotech III, Jersey Island, British Isles

4

1988

Development of Pulsed-Laser Velocimetry Systems using Photoelectric Image Sensors , Franklin Shaffer, James Ekmann, and Everett Ramer, DOE Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center, AIAA/ASME/SIAM/APS First National Fluid Dynamics Congress, Cincinnati, OH

5

1989

Fluid Mechanics of Ash Deposition, Franklin Shaffer, Everett Ramer, James Ekmann, Mahendra Mathur, Proceedings of the DOE Advanced Research and Technology Development Program Review Meeting, Morgantown, WV

6

1989

Pulsed-Laser Imaging of Particle-Wall Collisions,Franklin Shaffer and Everett Ramer, International Conference on Mechanics of Two-Phase Flows, Taipei, Taiwan

7

1990

Overview of Pneumatic Transport Research at the USDOE , George Klinzing, Mahendra Mathur, Franklin Shaffer, et al., Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center, Pneumatech 4, Glasgow, Scotland, June 1990

8

1991

Flow Dynamics of Ash Deposition in Heat-Exchanger Tube Banks , Franklin Shaffer, Mahendra Mathur, Ismail Celik, and Mehrdad Shahnam, Seventh Annual Coal Preparation, Utilization and Environmental Control Contractors Conference, Pittsburgh, PA

9

1991

Analysis of Pulse-Coded Particle Tracking Velocimetry Data, Ramakrishna Srinivasan, Ramanand Singh and Franklin Shaffer, IEEE International Conference on Pattern Recognition, Copenhagen, Denmark, September 1991

10

1992

Flow Dynamics of Ash Deposition, Franklin Shaffer, James Ekmann, and Mahendra Mathur, International Conference of Coal Science, Newcastle, UK

11

1991

Flow Visualization of the Novacor Left Ventricular Assist Device ,Franklin Shaffer, John Woodard, James Antaki, Harvey Borovetz, Richard Schaub, Bartley Griffith, Cardiovascular Science and Technology Conference, Bethesda, MD,

12

1992

Automated Analysis of Multiple-Pulse Particle Image Velocimetry Data ,  Everett Ramer and Franklin Shaffer, Journal of Applied Optics, Vol.31, No. 6, 1992

13

1992

Respiratory Dialysis: A New Concept in Pulmonary Support , Brack Hattler, Peter Johnson, Patricia Sawzik, Franklin Shaffer, Miroslav Klain, Laura Lund, Gary Reeder, Frank Walters, Joseph Goode, and Harvey Borovetz, Journal of the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs, Volume  38, Number 3.

14

1992

Fluorescent Image Tracking Velocimetry Applied to the Novacor Left Ventricular Assist Device ,Franklin  Shaffer, Mahendra  Mathur, Harvey Borovetz, Richard  Schaub, James Antaki, Robert Kormos, and Bartley Griffith, University of Pittsburgh Department of Surgery; John Woodard, Baxter Healthcare Novacor Division Oakland, CA; Ramakrishna  Srinivasan and Ramanand  Singh, SAIC, Forum on Multiphase Flows, ASME Fluids Engineering Meeting, Los Angeles, CA

15

1992

Optimal Management of a Ventricular Assist System ,John Woodard, Franklin Shaffer, Richard Schuab, Laura Lund, and Harvey Borovetz, Journal of the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs, Volume 38, Number 3.

16

1992

Development of an Axial Blood Flow Pump ,Kenneth Clark Butler, Timothy Maher, Harvey Borovetz, Robert Kormos, James Antaki, Marina Kameneva, Bartley Griffith, Timothy Zerbe, Franklin Shaffer, Journal of the,  American Society for Artificial Internal Organs, 38(3): M296-300,  1992, DOI: 10, 1097/00002480-199207000-00041J, 

17

1993

Fluorescent Image Tracking Velocimetry Algorithms for Quantitative Flow Analysis in Artificial Organ Devices ,  Ramanand Singh, Franklin Shaffer and Harvey Borovetz, International Symposium on Electronic Imaging, San Jose, CA, February 1993

18

1993

Fluorescent Image Tracking Velocimetry of the Nimbus Axipump ,James Kerrigan, Franklin Shaffer, Timothy Maher, Timothy Dennis, Harvey Borovetz, James Antaki, Journal of the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs, Volume 38, Number 3.

19

1994

Measurement of Time-Averaged Particle-Wall Collision Properties using Particle Tracking Velocimetry

Franklin Shaffer, Heshmet Massah, Jennifer Sinclair, and Mehrdad Shahnam, AIChE First International Forum on Particle Technology, Denver, Colorado.

20

1994

Quantitative Measurement of Flow in a Miniature Axial Blood Flow Pump using Fluorescent Image Tracking Velocimetry , James Kerrigan, James Antaki, Timothy Maher, and Franklin Shaffer, ASME Fluids Engineering Division Meeting, Symposium on Laser Anemometry, Lake Tahoe, Nevada

21

1994

Non-Intrusive Measurement of Particle-Wall Collision Properties,Heshmet Massah, Franklin Shaffer, Jennifer Sinclair, and Mehrdad Shahnam, AIChE Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA

22

1995

Measurement of Diffuse Particle-Wall Collision Properties ,Heshmet Massah, Franklin Shaffer, Jennifer  Sinclair and Mehrdad Shahnam, Fluidization VIII, Compiegne, France

23

1995

Long Time-Averaged Solutions of Turbulent Flow Past a Circular Cylinder  , Celik, I. and Shaffer, F., Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial. Aerodynamics, 56, 185-212, 1995

24

1995

The Aerodynamic Behavior of Charged Particles in an Electrostatic Separation Process,Jack Doney, Jennifer  Sinclair, Dennis Finseth and Franklin Shaffer, ASME Fluids Engineering Division Symposium on Gas-Solid Flows, Hilton Head, NC

25

1995

Flow Visualization Studies in the Novacor Left Ventricular Assist System , Final Report, Harvey Borovetz, University of Pittsburgh, Presbyterian Hospital, Artificial Heart Program, Franklin Shaffer, US Department of Energy Cooperative Research and Development Agreement, CRADA PC91-002

26

1995

Vortex Ring Formation and Mixing in Laminar Air Flows ,  Hura, H., Breen, B., Shahnam, M., and Shaffer, F., ASME Fluids Engineering Division Meeting, Symp. on Numerical Flow Visualization, Hilton Head, NC, August

27

1995

A Comparative Application of Laser Doppler Velocimetry and Particle Tracking Velocimetry for Particle-Wall Collisions , Heshmet Massah, Mehrdad Shahnam, Jennifer Sinclair and Franklin Shaffer, ASME Fluids Engineering Division Meeting, Symposium on Laser Anemometry, Hilton Head, NC

28

1995

A Study of the Electromedic Autotransfusion System , Summary Report, DOE Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA), FETC-991089

29

1996

A Hot Gas Cleanup Filter Design Methodology , John VanOsdol, Richard Dennis and Franklin Shaffer, Advanced Coal-Fired Power Systems Review Meeting DOE Morgantown Energy Technology Center

30

2010

The Effect of Cohesive Forces on Catalyst Entrainment in Fluidized Bed Regenerators , R. Cocco, Frank Shaffer, Roy. Hays, S.B.Reddy. Karri, Ted M. Knowlton, J. Powder Tech, V. 203, Issue 1

31

2010

NETL Report on PIV Analysis of the Minimum Flow Rate of Crude Oil from the BP Deepwater Horizon ,Franklin Shaffer, Plume Team of the Flow Rate Technical Group of the National Incident Command, May, 26, 2010

32

2010

Estimate of the Maximum Oil Leak Rate from the BP Deepwater Horizon based on Particle Tracking Velocimetry, Theoretical Jet Analysis, and CFD ,Franklin Shaffer, Nathan Weiland, Mehrdad Shahnam, Madhava Syamlal, George Richards, US DOE National Energy Technology Laboratory, Plume Analysis Team of the National Incident Command, July 15, 2010

33

2010

Particle Clusters in and above Fluidized Beds , Ray Cocco, Franklin Shaffer, Roy Hays, S.B. Reddy Karri, and Ted Knowlton, Journal of Powder Technology, Vol. 203, Issue 1, pages 3-11

34

2010

Particle Clusters in Fluidized Beds , Ray Cocco, Franklin Shaffer, S.B. Reddy Karri and Ted Knowlton, Thirteenth International Conference on Fluidization – A New Paradigm in Fluidization Engineering, Gyeong-ju, South Korea

35

2010

Quantification of Riser Hydrodynamics,Franklin Shaffer, Ted Knowlton,  Jei-Wei Chew, and Balaji Gopalan,
Particle Technology Forum, AIChE Annual Meeting

36

2010

CFD Analysis of a High-Speed Respiratory Assist Catheter,Greg Burgreen, Nathanial Moore, Brian Frankowski, Franklin  Shaffer, Balaji Gopalan, William Federspiel, Journal American Society Artificial Internal Organs, May 2010

37

2010

High Speed PIV of Flow Fields in An Impeller Driven Respiratory Assist Catheter ,  Nathanial Moore, Franklin Shaffer, Balaji Gopalan, William Federspiel, Greg Burgreen,  AIChE Annual Meeting, November 9, 2010

38

2012

A new method for decomposition of high-speed particle image velocimetry data , Balaji Gopalan and Franklin Shaffer, Journal of Powder Technology, Volume 220, Pages 164-171

39

2012

Review of flow rate estimates of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill ,Marcia McNutt, Rich Camilli, Timothy  Crone, George Guthrie, Paul Hsieh, Thomas Ryerson, Omer Savas, and Franklin Shaffer, Proceedings of the National Academies of Science, Special Feature Perspective, 109 (50) 20260-20267, December 11, 2012

40

2012

Particle and particle cluster hydrodynamics in a circulating fluidized bed riser,Ray Cocco, S.B. Reddy Karri, Ted Knowlton, Balaji Gopalan, Franklin Shaffer, Jei-Wei Chew, and Christine Hrenya, Fluidized Bed Combustion XXI, Volume 21, pages 1–8, Napoli, Italy

41

2013

Higher order statistical analysis of Eulerian particle velocity data in CFB risers as measured with high-speed particle imaging  Balaji Gopalan and Franklin Shaffer, Journal of Powder Technology, Volume 242, Pages 13-26, July 2013

42

2013

Particle cluster dynamics during fluidization, Jennifer McMillan, Frank Shaffer, Balaji Gopalan, Jia-Wei Chew, Christine Hrenya, Roy Hays, S.B. Reddy Karri and Ray Cocco, Journal of Chemical Engineering Science, Volume 100, pages 39-52 

43

2013

High speed imaging of particle flow fields in CFB risers, F,  Shaffer, Goplan, B, Breault R, W, Cocco, R, Karri, S, B, R, Hays, R, Knowlton, T,  Journal of Powder Technology, vol 75, pp,  1-14, 2013, 

44

2014

Challenge Problem I:  Model validation of circulating fluidized beds ,Panday, R, Shadle, L, J, Shahnam, M, Cocco, R, Issangya, A, Spenik, J, Ludlow, J, C, Gopalan, B, Shaffer, F, Syamlal, M, Guenter, C, Karri, S, B, R, Knowlton, T, Powder Technology, vol 258, pp 1-22, 2014, 

45

2015

Determining the discharge rate from a submerged oil leak jet using ROV video ,,  Frank Shaffer, Ömer Savaş, Kenneth Lee, and Giorgio de Vera, UC Berkeley ME Dept, Journal of Flow Measurement and Instrumentation, 43, 34–46, 2015

46

2016

Underwater oil jet: Hydrodynamics and droplet size distribution , Lin Zhao, Franklin Shaffer, Brian Robinson, Thomas King, Christopher Ambrosea, Zhong Feng, Gao Richard S, Miller, Robyn N, Conmye, Michel C, Boufadel, Chemical Engineering Journal, Vol 299, Pages 292-303, 1 Sep 2016

47

2016

Measurements of pressure drop and particle velocity in a pseudo 2-D rectangular bed with Geldart Group D particles ,Balaji Gopalan, Mehrdad Shahnam, Rupen Panday, Jonathan Tucker, Frank Shaffer, Lawrence Shadle, Joseph Mei, William Rogers, Chris Guenther, and Madhava Syamlal,  Powder Technology, Vol 291, Pages 299-310, April 2016

48

2017

Statistics of velocity fluctuations of Geldart A particles in a circulating fluidized bed riser ,  Vaidheeswaran, Avinash, Shaffer, Franklin D, Gopalan, Balaji,  Physical Review Fluids, Nov 21 2017, 10, 1103, PhysRevFluids, 2, 112301

49

2018

Investigation of rope formation in gas–solid flows through a 90° pipe bend using high-speed video and CFD simulations ,Sai S Guda, Steven L Rowan, Tao Yang, Franklin Shaffer, Ismail B Celik, The Journal of Computational Multiphase Flows, April 2018

50

2018

Analysis of a Vortexing CFB for Process Intensification via High-G Flows ,Michael Bobek, Steven L Rowan, Jingsi Yang, Justin Weber, Franklin Shaffer, Ronald Breault, Journal of Energy Resources Technology, Transactions of the ASME 140(6), March 2018

51

2020

On the near field interfaces of homogeneous and immiscible round turbulent jets , Eric Ibarra, Franklin Shaffer, and Ömer Savaş, UC Berkeley Dept of Mech Engr, Journal of Fluid Mechanics, Volume 889, February, 2020

52

2021

Visualization of submerged turbulent jets using particle tracking velocimetry , Franklin Shaffer, Eric Ibarra and Ömer Savaş, UC Berkeley Department of Mechanical Engineering, Journal of Visualization, Feb 15, 2021

The chart below shows the chronological cumulative number of my publications on the development and application of hcPTV, and the same for NETL without me (by Breault & Weber).  Before Breault attacked me forced to flee the NETL to protect my life so he and Weber could engage in espionage, Breault and Weber had no experience with hcPTV.

This is the flowchart for the FORTRAN (Formula Translation) code that implements US Patent 8,391,552.  It is more than 6000 lines of FORTRAN code.  To read the flowchart, I had a 5’ x 4’ print made and hung it on the wall of my office.

Click here or on the flowchart to download the entire FORTRAN code.

I named my FORTRAN code “Trajectory_Identification.for”  The following went into the development of this flowchart and the Trajectory_Identification code: 

1. More than twenty years of engineering effort, including years of effort by a PhD Nuclear Engineer.
2. Millions of taxpayer dollars.
3. The largest, best-staffed, best equipped lab in the world for the study of particle flows.
4. Behind-the-scenes support from Congressman Harley O. Staggers Sr, Chair of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.
5. Behind-the-scenes support from the Honorable Attorney Congressman Harley O. Staggers Jr, House Judiciary Committee
6. Lots of coffee
7. Lots of prayer

After Breault used fabricated false charges against me and used violence to force me to flee from the NETL to protect my life, he and Weber claimed they created the same technology of 8,391,552 -- in just a few months.

I’d given them an executable version of Trajectory_Identification.  To use Patent 8,391,552, all they had to do was enter these basic parameters into a file I named “Exogenous_Input_Parameters_for_Trajectory_Identificaion.txt”

25000      ! Number of camera frames to analyze

12500      ! Camera frame rate in frames per second

1000,1000  ! Camera resolution in pixels

0.005      ! Width of camera field-of-view in meters

0.005      ! Height of field-of-view in meters

10.0       ! Maximum particle velocity in meters/second

Breault and Weber then illegally transferred the technology of 8,391,552 to the following engineers, who then illegally “proliferated” this technology throughout the world:

ENGINEER ENGAGING IN ESPIONAGE

COUNTRY / COMPANY PARTICIPATING IN ESPIONAGE
BY USING US PATENT 8,391,552 WITHOUT RECOGNITION AND
WITHOUT PAYING ROYALTIES

Tingwen Li

Saudi Arabia / Saudi Aramco

John Higham

United Kingdom / University of Sheffield and others

Bill Rogers

China, Israel and others

Balaji Gopalan

Saint Gobian / Worldwide

Ronald Breault and Justin Weber

Saudi Aramco and member companies of PSRI / Worldwide

More coming soon…