NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF THE IMPACT OF BLOOD DROPS: A COMPARISON BETWEEN ANSYS FLUENT AND OPENFOAM

Bloodstain Pattern Analysis (BPA) is widely used in forensic investigations, although its interpretation often involves uncertainties related to droplet impact dynamics. In this work, the impact of a blood droplet on a solid surface was simulated using the Volume of Fluid (VOF) method in ANSYS Fluent and OpenFOAM. Simulations reproduced experimental conditions for two impact velocities, and the maximum spreading ratio was used for validation. Both solvers showed good agreement with experimental data, with the greatest error being less than 9%, indicating that CFD can capture the main physics of droplet impact.