Deposition

Abstract

Deposition of particles present in the air environment of enclosures and transported by its motion is a process that is important for the removal of particles from the enclosure volume. It can serve in cleaning the indoor air from unwanted impurities or, to the contrary, it can bring pollution to the surface that is the target of the deposition. The wall deposition (plateout), in particular, is the deposition applied to the surfaces surrounding the enclosure, a volume of a room, vessel, chamber, reactor, mine, or similar space. This process is at the end of the aerosol particle transport. It usually is a consequence of the interaction of the turbulent bulk motion with the diffusion near the wall and the wall attachment via van der Waals forces. Plateout has been widely studied experimentally and analytically using a variety of approaches and with many achievements. The aerosol chamber with an accurately controlled condensation nuclei, air flow and thermal properties together with a radioactive aerosol belong to the most advanced tools in deposition research. Despite advances in deposition research, the details of this process are not yet fully understood. This chapter aims to survey the achievements and formulate challenges motivating further research into aerosol particle deposition.