The application of pesticides in agriculture production systems is a complex process and involves a series of factors that dynamically interact to impact overall pesticide application efficacy. Spray droplet formation, target impaction and deposition, plant uptake, and subsequent biological response are all functions of pesticide active ingredient, nozzle selection, application pressure, and carrier volume. Smaller spray droplets with a lower kinetic energy result in greater spray droplet retention on the leaf surface relative to larger droplets. Consequently, larger spray droplets with higher kinetic energy are poorly retained on the leaf surface and yield minimal coverage of leaf surface tissue. While smaller droplets maximize target coverage and spray droplet retention, larger spray droplets minimize off-target movement and agrichemical transport. Consequently, application factors that maximize pesticide efficacy and minimize off-target movement are often incongruous elements. Therefore, the objective of this research was to evaluate the impact of carrier volume and spray droplet size on the efficacy of various pesticide applications in Mississippi. These data indicate that 1) for thrips and tarnished plant bug control, acephate and sulfoxaflor are superior dicamba application partners relative to dimethoate and thiamethoxam, respectively, insecticide efficacy did not vary due to spray droplet size when applied without dicamba, and maximum efficacy was achieved with a carrier volume of 187 L ha-1; 2) dicamba + acephate and dicamba + thiamethoxam or sulfoxaflor are efficacious options to control Palmer amaranth relative to dicamba applied alone, and maximum Palmer amaranth control was achieved with a carrier volume of 187 L ha-1; 3) cotton defoliation efficacy is positively and negatively correlated with carrier volume and spray droplet size, respectively, and maximum efficacy was achieved with cotton defoliation programs consisting of two-applications, each with a carrier volume of 187 L ha-1 and 200 µm droplets; 4) soybean harvest aid efficacy is primarily a function of the harvest aid applied and that the impact of carrier volume and spray droplet size varies across harvest aids. However, when paraquat is applied, a carrier volume between 47 and 187 L ha-1 should be utilized with droplets of 200-500 µm to maximize harvest aid efficacy.

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An experimental investigation was performed to study the influence of the bubble size on an effervescent atomization. Experiments were conducted in horizontal facility with a 25.4mm diameter feeding pipe using water and air as the working fluids that were sprayed through an effervescent nozzle. Water flow rates from 113 to 189 kg/min and air to liquid mass ratios from 1% to 4% were selected. High speed photographs, of the bubbles in the feeding conduit and of the resulting droplets on the spray, were taken to use the particle projected areas to estimate their sizes. A monotonic positive correlation was found between the bubble size and the droplet size, in a fairly narrow range of feed flow void fractions. A bubble size sensitivity parameter was defined. Knowledge of the droplet behaviour provides data to enhance the design and operating conditions of the atomization process and a means to control droplet size.

An experimental investigation was performed to study the influence of the bubble size on an effervescent atomization. Experiments were conducted in horizontal facility with a 25.4mm diameter feeding pipe using water and air as the working fluids that were sprayed through an effervescent nozzle. Water flow rates from 113 to 189 kg/min and air to liquid mass ratios from 1% to 4% were selected. High speed photographs, of the bubbles in the feeding conduit and of the resulting droplets on the spray, were taken to use the particle projected areas to estimate their sizes. A monotonic positive correlation was found between the bubble size and the droplet size, in a fairly narrow range of feed flow void fractions. A bubble size sensitivity parameter was defined. Knowledge of the droplet behaviour provides data to enhance the design and operating conditions of the atomization process and a means to control droplet size.

No description available.

The aim of this study was to observe the properties of a spray field, with micro particle image velocimetry (£gPIV) and holographic interferometric particle imaging (IPI) employed for the imaging and analysis of the global spray field. The experiment adopted different nozzle diameters (dj = 200 £gm, and dj = 500 £gm) and different values of gauge pressure (£GP = 300 kPa, £GP = 500 kPa, and £GP = 700 kPa) as the main parameters, and DI (distilled) Water as the working medium. The study was divided into two parts. The first part used the £gPIV system to observe the two-dimensional global visualization of spray field distribution and spray angle from each nozzle under different values of gauge pressure (£GP). The flow velocity distribution and variations (axial velocity, and impact velocity) of the global spray frame were also measured. As the nozzle diameter would determine the distribution of spray droplets, the second part adopted the IPI system to measure and explore the atomized droplet sizes from each nozzle under different values of gauge pressure (£GP), whereby drop size histograms were created through statistical analysis.

Water and R-134a sprays as they impinge on the flat endplate of a circle are studied experimentally. In order to optimize water and R-134a sprays cooling efficiency, a detailed characterization and understanding of the spray formation is essentially needed. The effects of the jet exit velocity and Weber number on spray segregation are investigated. An optical image system was used to quantify the droplet size and distribution. LDV measurements were used to characterize the local velocity and velocity fluctuation distribution from a commercial available nozzle in both axial and radial directions. It is found in the water spray that local mean droplet diameter (SMD) decreases as jet exit velocity increases and as jet proceeds further downstream as well. Furthermore, the SMD and radial velocity are found to be the largest at the outer edges of the water spray. In contrast, the radial velocity is found to be the smallest at the outer edges of the R-134a spray. The SMD and radial velocity continuously decrease across both the water spray and R-134a spray toward the jet axis; while the corresponding axial velocity is the maximum there. Moreover, the R-134a spray jet heat transfer in non-boiling regime was shown to be dependent on the velocity of the impinging jets in terms of Weber number and other related parameters which are in good agreement with those of previous studies.

This work detailed the physical and chemical characterization of oil water mixtures prepared using fresh and weathered Macondo related oils under different conditions of mixing energy/time and in the presence/absence of chemical dispersants. The results indicated that WAFs produced consistent, droplet free solutions for both source and weathered oils with concentration ranges that represented the soluble components of the oil used. Chemically enhanced WAFs prepared with the source oil generated a large amount of micron-size droplets; however the viscosity of the weathered oils were a limiting factor for the preparation of CEWAFs with weathered oils. Droplet size distributions were influenced by the amount of energy in the system and the oil weathering stage, when high energy WAFs were made the increase in weathering of the oil resulted in the formation of smaller droplets that were more stable over time.

In this work the differences between and characteristics of water and high solids, heated black liquor sprays from air-assist atomizers are examined. Sprays were imaged with a high speed camera and the images analyzed with computer code to produce droplet size data and macroscopic spray characteristics such as mass distribution. Fluid flow rates were measured to allow relevant dimensionless groups for the spray to be calculated. A 1000 degree C tubular furnace was placed around the spray to determine the effect of industrially relevant temperatures on the droplet formation process, relative to room-temperature conditions. It was found that high solids black liquor forms long, thin ligaments rather than droplets. In high-temperature surroundings the size of these ligaments increases, which from a comparison with theory in the literature was attributed to enhanced skin-formation driven by heat transfer. The data suggest that this skin formation may prevent secondary breakup. All sprays for both fluids produced droplet size mass distributions that were well described by the square-root normal distribution. The normalized width (s*) of these distributions was similar for all sprays and consistent with literature data for other nozzle designs (0.24 < s* < 0.38). The image analysis method assumed droplets were spheres with the same projected area. When this assumption was changed for black liquor sprays to a cylindrical droplet assumption, the shape and normalized width of the resulting mass distributions remained the same, but the representative diameter (calculated from surface area to volume ratios) decreased. Based on the agreement between the normalized distribution width in this work and that in the black liquor spraying literature it was concluded that the addition of atomizing air cannot be considered a means to narrow a droplet size distribution independent of droplet size. The results also indicate the importance of including the effects of skin formation and temperature- and time-dependent fluid properties in spray modeling. It is intended that these results contribute to increased understanding of the black liquor atomization process and lead to improved computational modeling of the same.

Annual bluegrass (Poa annua L.) is a problematic weed in turfgrass that has evolved resistance to twelve different herbicide sites of action. The mitotic-inhibiting herbicide pronamide has both pre- and post-emergence activity on susceptible annual bluegrass populations. Still, post-emergence activity may be compromised in some resistant populations due to the lack of root uptake or an unknown foliar resistance mechanism. Spray droplet size may affect foliar and soil deposition of pronamide, thus potentially explaining variation in population control or differential foliar and root uptake. Pronamide, flazasulfuron, and pronamide + flazasulfuron deposition were quantified on annual bluegrass as affected by spray-droplet size. The efficacy of these herbicide treatments in resistant (R) and susceptible (S) annual bluegrass populations was then evaluated with two droplet sizes (400 and 1000 μm). Absorption and translocation of pronamide were investigated in R and S populations following foliar-only and soil-only pronamide applications.