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£ 3~
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A. E.
DULLER
1 925-1 994
BY DAN LUSS AND MOVE WICKS
ON FEBRUARY 12,1994, Professor Abraham E. "Abe" Dukler
of the University of Houston died at the age of sixty-nine. Abe
was known worldwide for his contributions to the
understanding of multiphase flow. Among the other honors
he received, Abe was elected a fellow of the American Institute
of Chemical Engineers (AlChE) (1978) and a member of the
National Academy of Engineering (1977~. He served on the
editorial boards of three major technical journals:
International Journal for Multiphase Flow, Desalination, and
Chemical Engineering Communications.
Abe was born in Newark, New Jersey, on January 5,1925.
He earned his undergraduate degree from Yale University in
1945 and his M.S. and Ph.D. in chemical engineering from
the University of Delaware in 1949 and 1951, respectively. Af-
ter three years with Rohm and Haas, he joined Shell Oil at its
Houston refinery in 1950. From 1952 until his death, he was
affiliated with the University of Houston's Chemical Engineer-
ing Department, where he achieved the rank of professor in
1961. As one of the department's founders, he led its rise to
prominence among schools of chemical engineering in the
United States. He was dean of the Cullen College of Engineer-
ing from 1976 to 1982, then returned to research his first
and continuing love.
79
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
Abe was executive director of the governor's Energy Council
for the state of Texas from 1973 to 1975. He organized and
supervised a state-funded coordinating program designed to pro-
vide information for policymaking in Texas. These efforts
introduced sound technical considerations into Texas state poli-
cies on energy management, regulations, allocation, and control.
Abe's lifelong interest was in two-phase phenomena. Such
phenomena appear frequently in chemical engineering prac-
tice and in many other industrial processes, and proper
understanding and modeling constitute a crucial step in the
design and scale-up of a large variety of chemical and physical
processes. Unfortunately, despite the enormous practical im-
portance of this subject, it is so complicated that most
fluid-mechanics research experts chose to take simpler, "clean-
er" problems. Although some simple cases can be treated from
a strictly analytical point of view, most multiphase-flow phe-
nomena are far too complex to yield to treatments that do not
derive from a clear physical insight and an ability to make
proper simplifying assumptions. It is in this sense that Abe
Dukler made major contributions in this difficult and compli-
cated field. Through an impressive series of publications, he
led an effort to bring order to the understanding of two-phase
flow and laid the foundation for follow-on scholarly work by
himself, his students, and others.
Beginning with his doctoral work on falling films, Abe was
one of the pioneers ir1 the use of computational techniques,
applying them in his 1960 paper on heat-transfer in condens-
ers a major extension of Nusselt's 1906 paper on
heat-transfer through liquid films. From 1960 to 1965 Abe
directed the American Gas Association-American Petroleum
Institute project NX-28 at the University of Houston, a project
that led to the first schema for data collection and reporting
of multiphase-flow measurements. This "data bank" was con-
tinued and extended by workers at the University of Calgary in
Canada and the Harwell Laboratory in the United Kingdom.
Recognizing the lack of communication between academic
researchers and industrial practitioners, Abe's drive and en-
thusiasm sparked the formation of the Arrlerican Institute of
Chemical Engineers' Ad Hoc Committee on Multiphase Flow.
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A. E. DUKLER
81
Through his guidance and persistent efforts, the activities of
this committee culminated in the establishment of the AIChE
Design Institute for Multiphase Processing (DIMP). Abe
served as the first chairman of its Technical Committee.
Abe was clearly a key force in the DIMP effort. With Y. Taite!
and others, he developed methods to predict the types of flow
regimes that exist under given conditions of flow rate, fluid prom
erties, and pipe geometry, laying the groundwork for systematic
studies of the phenomena contributing to pressure-drop and
energy-Ioss in each flow regime. All flow regimes received a share
of Abe's attention, and in each case the technical community
was enriched by his efforts. Indeed, without these contributions,
the petroleum industry probably would not have rational design
tools to size offshore oil- and gas-transportation systems reliably.
Abe's research led to major improvements in design methods
for flow in vertical and deviated oil and gas wells and made accu-
rate hydraulic design possible.
With great insight, Abe developed new, unique experimental
tools and accompanying analytical methods to examine the de-
tailed behavior of two-phase systems, including capacitance
probes for film thickness and bulk-entrainment gauges. These
techniques allowed flow-pattern identification from wall-pressure
fluctuations, determination of local void-fractions and surface-
wave thickness, and droplet-size and diffusion measurements.
Abe's measuring methods have become standard techniques.
He was also the first to break down complex two-phase flow prob-
lems into their component parts with subsequent systematic
analyses of each part. An understanding of the underlying physi-
cal phenomena was then integrated and used to solve important
"real-world" two-phase flow problems. Abe had a special ability to
reach to the heart of complex problems, pulling out their essen-
tial features and obtaining solutions of academic interest and
practical value. His rare insight permitted specific identification
of which problems should be attacked and when. Whether to
the inspiration or occasional dismay of his students, Abe kept a
watchful eye on any advance in technology that might give in-
sight into the macroscopic design information needed by
practitioners.
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
In recent years, Abe worked on two-phase flow problems in
space technology. In space stations, climate control is achieved
by transporting heat from laboratories and living areas to
space radiators placed in remote locations. Very efficient heat-
transport may be achieved with volatile two-phase mixtures,
often driven by capillary forces. Unfortunately, the behavior
of two-phase flow in zero gravity is unknown. Abe and his stu-
dents, in close collaboration with I. Fabre of L'Institut
National Polytechnique de Toulouse, modeled the intriguing
behavior of two-phase flow under microgravity conditions. In
cooperation with the NASA Lewis Research Center and the
Johnson Space Center, Abe designed and built two experi-
ments to be conducted on the 1998 space shuttle flights. Sadly,
these experiments will now be conducted without the benefit
of Abe's keen insight.
Additional national and international honors earned by Abe
Dukler during his career included a senior postdoctoral fel-
lowship from the National Science Foundation (1967), the
Alpha Chi Sigma Award for chemical engineering research
from the AIChE (1970), the Lady Davis Visiting Scholar Award
from the Technion Institute in Israel (1976), the Chemical
Engineering Lectureship Award for Research from the Ameri-
can Society of Engineering Education (1976), and the Donald
Q. Kern Award from the AIChE (1988~. Local recognition in-
cluded the bestowal of the Cullen College of Engineering
Alumni Association (EAA) Distinguished Facult,v Award
(1989), the EAA's posthumous naming of the award in Abe's
honor, the University of Houston's Esther Farfel Award for
excellence in teaching (1989), and the "Best Fundamental
Paper" award of the AIChE's south Texas section (eight
times) .
Out of respect for Abe's enduring and pioneering contribu-
tions, the Engineering Dean's Of flee of the University of
Houston has established and is coordinating the Abraham E.
Dukler Scholarship Endowment.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
multiphase flow
