WATER-ASSISTED FLOW OF HEAVY OIL IN A

VERTICAL PIPE: PILOT-SCALE EXPERIMENTS

Antonio C. Bannwarta, Oscar M. H. Rodriguezb, Jorge L. Biazussia, Fabio N.

Martinsb, Macelo Sellib, Carlos H. M. de Carvalhoc
a
Dept. Petroleum Engineering, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, State University of
Campinas, Campinas, SP, Brazil, Email: bannwart@dep.fem.unicamp.br
b
Dept. Mechanical Engineering, Engineering School of São Carlos, University of São
Paulo, São Carlos, Brazil, Email: oscarmhr@sc.usp.br
c
PETROBRAS, CENPES/PDP/TE, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Email:
chmc@petrobras.com.br

ABSTRACT
The use of the core-annular flow pattern, where a thin fluid surrounds a very viscous one,
has been suggested as an attractive artificial-lift method for heavy oils in the current
Brazilian ultra-deepwater production scenario. This paper reports the pressure drop
measurements and the core-annular flow observed in a 2 7/8-inch and 300 meter deep
pilot-scale well conveying a mixture of heavy crude oil (2000 mPa.s and 950 kg/m3 at 35
oC) and water at several combinations of the individual flow rates. The two-phase
pressure drop data are compared with those of single-phase oil flow to assess the gains
due to water injection. Another issue is the handling of the core-annular flow once it has
been established. High-frequency pressure-gradient signals were collected and a
treatment based on the Gabor transform together with neural networks is proposed as a
promising solution for monitoring and control. The preliminary results are encouraging.
The pilot-scale tests, including long-term experiments, were conducted in order to
investigate the applicability of using water to transport heavy oils in actual wells. It
represents an important step towards the full scale application of the proposed artificial-
lift technology. The registered improvements in terms of oil production rate and pressure
drop reductions are remarkable.

1. INTRODUCTION
The existence of a thin film adjacent to the pipe wall and surrounding a viscous phase has
been the explanation for very low frictional pressure gradients observed in liquid-liquid pipe
flow. In two-phase pipe flow of immiscible liquids the annular flow pattern, also known as
core-annular flow, is observed when the conditions are such that both fluids form continuous
and parallel phases. A very interesting feature of this flow configuration is that the frictional
pressure drop is comparable to that of single-phase flow of the thinner fluid under equivalent
flow conditions [1]. Therefore, core-annular flow has been successfully applied to the
conveyance of viscous oils using water as lubricant [2,3]. In view of the many technological
difficulties regarding the production of very viscous oils, the artificial lift of heavy oil via
core-annular flow has been recently proposed as a profitable alternative in the Brazilian ultra-
deep water production scenario.

1
Since the pioneer studies [4,5], the advantages of the core-annular flow pattern for the
transport of viscous oils have been fully appreciated. A significant amount of theoretical and
experimental works have been accomplished mainly for horizontal flow, with application to
heavy oil transportation [6-9]. A study of the state of the art in horizontal oil-water flow
(including viscous oils) showed that there are still many discrepancies in two-phase pressure
drop prediction [10]. Therefore, the development and improvement of models is in order.
Even when the oil viscosity is only few times higher than water, there is not a definitive
model or correlation for predicting the two-phase pressure drop [11-13]. Recently, a refined
pressure-loss model for core-annular flow has been proposed and its predictions were
compared with data obtained in pilot-scale horizontal-flow experiments (3-inch i.d. 300 m
long pipeline), with good agreement [14].
Few works on pressure drop in upward-vertical core-annular flow have been found in the
literature. There is a study focused on measuring velocity profiles in a glycerin (core) and
Flexon-845 (annulus) flow inside a two-inch schedule Pyrex sewed pipe [15]. Several
hydrodynamic features of oil-water core-annular flow in a 0.9525-cm-i.d. glass tube,
including interfacial wave phenomena, pressure drop and oil volume fraction have been
investigated [16,17]. Pressure drop measurements in horizontal 15.74-mm-i.d. and vertical
62-mm-i.d. tubes, using a highly viscous water-in-oil emulsion as the core phase and an
aqueous solution with drag reducer as the annulus phase, have been reported [18]. It has been
suggested that the use of core-annular flow pattern should be attractive in heavy oil
production and a correlation inspired by the Perfect Core-Annular Flow (PCAF) formulation
was proposed [19]. Recently, new correlations for prediction of pressure drop and holdup in
horizontal and vertical core-annular flow were proposed and tested, with good agreements
with data [20-22].
Regarding the objective characterization of flow patterns, electrical impedance signal analysis
and neural networks have been used to define gas-liquid flow patterns in a vertical pipe, with
relatively good accuracy [23]. Images, collected in upward-vertical water-air flow via
dynamic neutron radiography, wavelet transform and neural networks were used to recognize
four different flow patterns in metallic pipes, with and accuracy of 95% [24]. Acquisition of
conductivity signals, probabilistic neural network and statistical analysis were the tools
applied to classify five gas-liquid flow patterns in upward-vertical flow, with a perfect match
achieved in about 95% of the studied cases [25]. Electrical resistance tomography and
wavelet-transform signal analysis have been also applied in upward-vertical air-water flow-
pattern classification, with errors of about 20% [26]. Recently, a high-frequency differential-
pressure transducer was used for the acquisition of pressure-signature signals. They were
treated via Gabor transform and analyzed in a feed-forward back-propagation neural network,
which allowed the detection of several air-water flow patterns in a horizontal line with good
accuracy (100% in most of the cases) [27].
This paper reports pilot-scale upward-vertical oil-water flow experiments conducted in a 2
7/8-inch 300 m deep well. This is the first time, to the authors’ knowledge, that such series of
experiments were conducted in such a scale. The experiments were carried out in order to
assess the applicability of using water injection as an artificial-lift method for heavy oils in
actual wells. Two-phase pressure-drop data were compared with single-phase oil flow to
assess the gains due to water injection. High-frequency pressure-signature signals were
collected and a treatment based on Gabor transform together with neural networks is proposed
as a promising solution for monitoring and control of the core-annular flow pattern.

2
2. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP

2.1 Flow loop

The tests were performed in the multiphase-flow test facilities of the Research Centre
(CENPES) of PETROBRAS, Brazil. A schematic view of the “well test loop” can be seen in
Figure 1. Water and oil were pumped from individual tanks to the test well. A set of Coriolis
flow meters delivered the individual water and oil flow rates. After the test well, the mixture
flows to a 50 m3 separator tank, from which water and oil are pumped to their respective
tanks. A control system keeps constant the water level of the separator tank.

Gas outlet Gás inlet

PV - 327

LIT - 301
PV -
326
separator

PIT - 314 PV - 314

BY-PASS

2”
Oil tank LIT - 303 X
8”

FT - 301

Ω
HV - 301 FT -
303
Well bypass
Oil flow rate
PV -
202
measurement
Oil pump

FV FV -
- 303

Water flow rate 30

PT - 329 TT - 329 6
measurement
Return line
LIT - 303

Ω
HV - 301

separator Check
TP
50 m3 PIT - 314
LIT - 303 filter
PIT - 314
Test
Water tank
Centrifugal well Injection
pump nozzle

Figure 1. Schematic view of the “well test loop” of PETROBRAS Research Centre, Brazil.

A visualization section (Fig. 1a) was installed at the head of the 2 7/8-inch (62 mm i.d.) 300
m deep test well (Fig. 2b). The annular space between casing and tubing was used to convey
water to a specially designed injection nozzle that was installed at bottom hole. The injection
nozzle was responsible for generating the core-annular flow pattern; oil was injected in the
core of the tubing, whereas water was injected adjacent to the tubing wall.

2.2 Experiments
The fluids used in the tests were dead crude oil of about 2000 mPa.s of viscosity and 950
km/m3 of density at test temperature (35 oC) and water. The ranges of oil and water superficial
velocities were chosen after analysis of a flow map specially drawn for the specific condition
of the test [28-30].

3
 (a) (b)
Figure 2. (a) Visualization section and explosion-proof video camera; (b) test-well head.

Figure 3 shows the flow map of the superficial velocities and the shaded square indicates the
tested ranges of oil and water superficial velocities:
• oil, 0.15 m/s (1.67 m3/h) to 0.64 m/s (6.97 m3/h),
• water, 0.03 m/s (0.32 m3/h) to 0.08 m/s (0.86 m3/h).

OW

B UCAF

SCAF WO

Figure 3. Flow map of oil and water superficial velocities, Uos and Uws, respectively; OW –
dispersion of oil in water; B – oil bubbles; I – intermittent; SCAF – stable core-annular flow; UCAF –
unstable core-annular flow; WO – dispersion of water in oil; the shaded box indicates the region
explored in the experiments.

Three measurements of pressure were taken: bottom hole, well head and return line. The
bottom-hole temperature was also measured. A high-frequency pressure transducer
(Validyne™) was installed at the well head with pressure taps connected 1 m apart from each

4
other. A high-speed video camera (Olympus™, 1000 fps) was used to collect images of the
flow and it was synchronized with the LabView™-based data-acquisition system.
The tests would start with single-phase water flow. Oil was then gradually added. The oil and
water flow rates were set to the predicted values. After reaching steady state, the high-speed
camera, data acquisition and recording systems (LabView™) were activated. One single test
would last about 20 minutes. However, long-term experiments were also carried out and
lasted about 6 hours.

3. SIGNAL TREATMENT AND ANALYSIS

3.1 Gabor transform

The analysis of the content of a pressure-signature signal based only on its Fourier transform
may not be sufficient to reveal every characteristics of a flow pattern. All temporal
information is lost due to the integration in time. Characteristic frequencies of a signal may
vary in time and such information is of major importance in flow pattern recognition [27].
The Gabor transform delivers a 2-D time-frequency spectral analysis from a raw 1-D signal in
time, revealing power density spectra related to each time instant. The Gabor transform
corresponds to an especial Short Time Fourier Transform in which the analysis function is the
Gaussian window:
మ
ℎሺ߬ሻ = ݁ ିఈ௧ (1)
were α is the parameter that controls the decay of the Gaussian window; in this work α = 0.5.

3.2 Neural networks

A feed-forward back-propagation neural network (FFBP) was implemented in the Stuttgart
Neural Network Simulator (SNNS). As a whole, 819 vectors of 320 elements and more than
30.000 periods were used for training a FFBP with the following structure: [20x16] – [10x8] –
[1x1]. The main goal was to determine whether the core-annular flow pattern had been
established. The chosen activation function was the tangent sigmoid:
ଶ
߮ሺ‫ݒ‬ሻ = ଵାୣ୶୮ (ିଶ௩) − 1 (2)

The neural network was designed to deliver real values between 0 and 1, i.e., false for any
different flow pattern and true for core-annular flow pattern. The training parameters were:
minimum learning rate for deactivating of 0.02, sigmoid activation function, neural network
initialized random weights, random updating of the weights and random input.

4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Table 1 presents time-averaged data of return line pressure (PRL), oil flow rate (Qo), bottom-
hole pressure (PBH), well-head pressure (PH), bottom-hole temperature (TBH), water flow rate
(Qw) and flow pattern visually observed. The first 13 lines refer to short-term oil-water flow
tests (20 min.). Lines 14, 15 and 16 refer to long-term oil-water flow tests (6 hours). Line 17
refers to a single-phase oil flow test carried out for comparison purpose.

5
4.1 Short-term oil-water flow tests
In Table 1, lines 4-8 and 10-16 refer to core-annular flow (Fig. 4). A comparison between
core-annular flow data with single-phase oil flow data basically reveals that there was a
decrease of the bottom-hole pressure of about 25%.
Table 1. Time-averaged experimental data.
PRL Qo PBH PH TBH Qw Observed Flow pattern
# [kgf/cm²] [m³/h] [kgf/cm²] [kgf/cm²] [°C] [m³/h]
1 0,04126 2,35174 26,76296 0,14128 34,64351 0,77456 Transition annular-intermittent

2 0,04115 2,41332 26,60797 0,06849 34,53633 0,75531 Transition annular-intermittent

3 0,09089 2,54124 26,70775 0,27336 34,55998 0,74331 Transition annular-intermittent

4 0,00000 3,93578 26,45545 0,06046 34,69715 0,37566 annular

5 0,00000 4,00479 26,42943 0,06340 34,67077 0,32421 annular

6 0,00000 1,67377 26,92332 0,02824 34,87327 0,85903 Annular

7 0,02913 5,28421 26,29817 0,04701 35,08922 0,35758 annular

8 0,03632 5,01559 26,75566 0,04631 34,40440 0,81140 annular

9 0,04140 3,06578 26,43428 0,05938 34,47484 0,72819 Transition annular-intermittent

10 0,04310 3,14330 26,58963 0,09492 34,51721 0,70051 annular

11 0,04261 4,13374 26,46044 0,06524 34,72665 0,66176 annular

12 0,03318 6,97188 26,38053 0,05806 35,18409 0,39710 annular

13 0,02916 6,23270 26,18776 0,05118 35,32285 0,54865 annular

14 0,04099 4,67441 26,75566 0,02432 35,00322 0,82982 annular (long-term test)

15 0,08788 5,15239 26,70318 0,28853 35,63462 0,63531 annular (long-term test)

16 0,09481 4,46924 26,61466 0,23273 35,67661 0,62539 annular (long-term test)

17 0,068718 2,82222 34,908058 0,16236 35,155387 0,000157 Single-phase oil

Figure 4. Core-annular flow pattern visualized in the well head (tubing of 2 7/8 inches).

6
The injection of water increases the weight of the hydrostatic column, since water is heavier
than oil. Therefore, the 25% decrease of bottom-hole pressure can only been explained by a
significant decrease of the frictional pressure drop. It is also important to point out that with
core-annular flow it was possible to reach an oil flow rate up to 2.5 times as high as the
maximum single-phase oil flow rate, given the safety limitation of the flow loop.

Figure 5. Pressure drop as a function of time for the 300 m deep well (PBH - PH).

Figure 6. Oil flow rate as a function of time in core-annular flow and single-phase oil flow.

7
Figure 5 shows pressure drop data (PBH - PH), related to the 300 m deep well, as a function of
time. The observed increasing trend of pressure drop with time in single-phase oil flow can be
explained by a tubing wall still wetted by water that gradually is being contaminated by oil.
The registered improvement in terms of pressure-drop reduction is remarkable.
Oil flow rate data related to core-annular flow and single-phase oil flow data as a function of
time can be seen in Figure 6. Notice that the oil flow rate in single-phase flow was the
maximum value that could be reached given the safety limitation of the flow loop. Therefore,
by using water injection not only the pressure drop is significantly reduced (25%, Fig. 5), but
also the oil flow rate is significantly increased (2.5 times).

4.2 Long-term oil-water flow tests

One of the commonly asked questions regarding the application of core-annular flow as an
artificial-lift method is whether the gains, in terms of oil production rate and pressure drop
reductions, can be sustained over time. Figure 7 shows oil and water flow rates and pressure
drop data as a function of time for a core-annular flow test that lasted about 6 hours. The
pressure drop remains almost constant, with slight increases around times 01:12:00 and
06:00:00. The increase in pressure drop is clearly associated to increases of oil flow rate. The
water flow rate remains essentially constant during the test.

28 28
26 26
24 24
22 PBH - PH 22

Pressure drop [kgf/cm ]

2
20 Qo 20
Flow rate [m /h]

18 Qw 18
3

16 16
14 14
12 12
10 10
8 8
6 6
4 4
2 2
0 0
00:00:00 01:12:00 02:24:00 03:36:00 04:48:00 06:00:00
Time [hh:mm:ss]
Figure 7. Oil and water flow rates and pressure drop data as a function of time.

As one may see in the flow map of Fig. 3, a sudden increase of oil flow rate may provoke
transition from annular to dispersion of water in oil. Phase inversion should be avoided at any
cost because it represents the loss of any possible gain due to water injection. One of the most
interesting findings of the long-term tests was that even in such a scale it was relatively easy

8
to control de core-annular flow by simply increasing the water flow rate and decreasing the oil
flow rate. By doing so, the pressure drop quickly returns to the previous values, as can be seen
in Fig. 7 (at times 01:12:00 and 06:00:00).

4.3 Time-frequency pressure signatures

Continuous samples at 100 Hz were collected for the pressure-signature signal analysis. More
than 900 vectors were acquired in 4 sec of sampling for each case investigated. Figures 8 and
9 present pressure-signature signals in time and time-frequency domains for core-annular flow
and dispersion of oil in water, respectively. The time-domain signal can be seen at the
topmost side and the other two pictures describe top view and topological view of the time-
frequency signal.
Diferential pressure in time

Figure 8. Pressure-signature signals in time and time-frequency domains for core-annular flow.

Diferential pressure in time

Figure 9. Pressure-signature signals in time and time-frequency domains for dispersed flow.

9
Despite of some subtle differences, the time-domain signals related to core-annular flow (Fig.
8) and oil-in-water dispersed flow (Fig. 9) are rather similar. On the other hand, the time-
frequency maps obtained via Gabor transform present significant differences (refer to Figs. 8
and 9). Therefore, the treated signals are divided in 20 lines and 16 columns that represent the
sweeping of the frequency spectrum for 4 sec. The set of 320-point signals were then used as
input data for the neural network.

4.4 Core-annular flow pattern recognition via neural networks

Figure 10 shows the medium square error (MSE) of the neural network training. As one can
see in Fig. 10, the MSE tends to the value of 0.098.

Figure 10. Medium square error (MSE) of the neural network training.

Figure 11. Square error of each analyzed vector.

10
However, the decay trend of the error was sustained, which indicates that an even lower error
could have been obtained. The error distribution was obtained through a test in the SNNS
analyzer. Figure 11 shows the square error of each analyzed vector. Vectors 1-318 refer to
core-annular flow, whereas vectors 319-819 refer to any other flow pattern. Adopting 0.15 as
the error threshold it is achieved less that 10% of error in the core-annular flow pattern
recognition. Notice that a significant amount of error concentrates in the false detection of
core-annular flow.

5. CONCLUSIONS
A pilot-scale experimental campaign was carried out in a 2 7/8-inch 300 m deep well in order
to assess the practical applicability of using water injection as an artificial-lift method for
heavy oils. Oil-water flow data were compared with single-phase oil flow and a decrease of
25% in bottom-hole pressure was measured for the same amount of produced oil, which
indicated a significant decrease of the frictional pressure drop. In addition, with core-annular
flow it was possible to reach an oil flow rate 2.5 times as high as the maximum single-phase
oil flow rate (the volumetric fraction of transported water was of the order of 5%). Long-term
oil-water flow tests were also conducted. The pressure drop and oil flow rate remained
practically constant for more than 6 hours of test. No trend of increase of pressure drop with
time was observed. One of the most interesting findings of the long-term tests was that even
in such a scale it was relatively easy to control de core-annular flow by simply increasing the
water flow rate and decreasing the oil flow rate. Therefore, phase inversion might be easily
avoided in practical application. High-frequency pressure-signature signals were collected and
a treatment based on Gabor transform together with neural networks was applied for flow-
pattern recognition. The core-annular flow pattern recognition rate was of the order of 90%.
The technique is suggested as a promising solution for monitoring and control of the water-
assisted artificial-lift technique. In general, the registered improvements in terms of oil
production rate and pressure drop reductions are remarkable. The reported pilot-scale
experiments represent an important step towards the full-scale application of the proposed
artificial-lift technology.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors are grateful to PETROBRAS (Petróleo Brasileiro S.A.) for the support in
different parts of this work

REFERENCES
1. Oliemans, R.V.A. and Ooms, G., (1986). Core-annular flow of oil and water through a pipeline. In G.F.
Hewitt, J.M. Delhaye and N. Zuber (Eds). Multiphase Science and Technology, vol. 2.
2. Visser, R.C., (1987). Offshore production of heavy oil, OTC 5494, pp. 89-96.
3. Joseph D.D and Renardy Y.Y., (1993). Fundamentals of Two-Fluid Dynamics, Part II: Lubricated
Transport, Drops and Miscible Liquids. Springer-Verlag, New York.
4. Russel, T.W.F. and Charles, M. E., (1959). The effect of the less viscous liquid in the laminar flow of
two-immiscible liquids, Can.J.Chem. Engng., 37, 18-24.
5. Charles, M.E., Govier, G.W. and Hodgson, G.W., (1961). The horizontal pipeline flow of equal density of
oil-water mixtures, Can. J. Chem. Engng., 39, 17-36.
6. Arney, M. S., Bai, R., Guevara, E., Joseph, D. D. and Liu, K., (1993). Friction factor and holdup studies
for lubricated pipelining-I, experiments and correlations, International Journal of Multiphase Flow, 19,
1061-1076.
7. Huang, A., Christodoulou, C. and Joseph, D.D., (1994). Friction factor and holdup studies for lubricated
pipelining-II, International Journal of Multiphase Flow, 20, 481-491.

11
 8. Arney, M.S., Ribeiro, G.S., Guevara, E., Bai, R. and Joseph, D.D., (1996). Cement-lined pipes for water
lubricated transport of heavy oil, International Journal of Multiphase Flow, 22, 207-221.
9. Bannwart , A.C., (1999). A simple model for pressure drop in horizontal core annular flow, Journal of the
Brazilian Society of Mechanical Sciences, 21, 233-244.
10. Sotgia, G. and Tartarini, P., (2001). Experimental and theoretical investigation on pressure drop
reductions in oil water flows. 4th International Conference of Multiphase Flow, New Orleans, Lousiana.
11. Valle A. and Utvik O.H., (1997). Pressure drop, flow pattern and slip for two phase crude oil/water flow:
Experiments and model predictions. International Symposium on Liquid-Liquid Two Phase Flow and
Transport Phenomena, Antalya, Turkey.
12. Angeli P. and Hewitt G. F., (1998). Pressure gradient in horizontal liquid-liquid flows, International
Journal of Multiphase Flows, 24, 1183-1203.
13. Lovick, J. and Angeli, P., (2001). Two-phase liquid flows at the partially dispersed flow regime. 4th
International Conference of Multiphase Flow, New Orleans, Lousiana.
14. Rodriguez, O.M.H. and Bannwart, A., (2009). Pressure loss in core-annular flow: modeling,
experimental investigation and full-scale experiments. Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering,
65, 67-75.
15. Shertok, J. T., (1975). Velocity profiles in core-annular flow using Laser-Doppler velocimeter. Ph.D.
thesis, Department of Chemical Engineering, Princeton University.
16. Bai, R., (1995). Traveling waves in a high viscosity ratio and axisymmetric core annular flow. Ph.D.
thesis. Faculty of the Graduate School, University of Minnesota.
17. Bai, R., Kelkar, K. and Joseph, D.D., (1996). Direct simulation of interfacial waves in a high-viscosity-
ratio and axisymmetric core-annular flow, Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 327, 1-34.
18. Ho, W. S. and Li, N. N., (1994). Core-annular flow of liquid membrane emulsion, American Institution of
chemical Engineers Journal, 40, 1961-1968.
19. Vanegas-Prada, J.W., Bannwart, A.C., (2001). Modelling of vertical core-annular flows and application to
heavy oil production, Journal of Energy Resources Technology - Transactions of the ASME, 123 194-
199.
20. Rodriguez, O.M.H. and Bannwart, A.C., (2006). Experimental study on interfacial waves in vertical core
flow. Journal of Petroleum Sciences and Engineering, 54, 140-148.
21. Rodriguez, O.M.H., Bannwart, A.C., and de Carvalho, C.H.M., (2009). Pressure loss in core-annular
flow: Modeling, experimental investigation and full-scale experiments, Journal of Petroleum Science &
Engineering, 65, 67-75.
22. Bannwart, A.C., Rodriguez, O.M.H., Trevisan, F., Vieira, F, de Carvalho, C.H.M., (2009). Experimental
Investigation on Liquid-Liquid-Gas Flow: Flow Patterns and Pressure-Gradient. Journal of Petroleum
Science & Engineering, 65, 1-13.
23. Mi, Y., Ishii, M., and Tsoukalas, L.H. (2001). Flow regime identification methodology with neural
networks and two-phase flow models, Nuclear Engineering and Design, 204, 87-100.
24. Sunde, C., Avdic, S., Pazsit, I., (2005). Classification of two-phase flow regimes via image analysis and a
neuro-wavelet approach, Progress in Nuclear Energy, 46, 348-358.
25. Hernandez, L., Julia, J.E., Chiva, S., Paranjape, S., and Ishii, M., (2006). Fast classification of two-phase
flow regimes based on conductivity signals and artificial neural networks, Measurement Science &
Technology, 17, 1511-1521.
26. Tan, C., Dong, F., and Wu, M., (2007). Identification of gas/liquid two-phase flow regime through ERT-
based measurement and feature extraction, Flow Measurement and Instrumentation, 18255-261 Art No.
10.1016/j.flowmeasinst.2007.08.003.
27. Selli, M., and Seleghim Jr., P., (2007). Online Identification of Horizontal Two-Phase Flow Regimes
Through Gabor Transform and Neural Network Processing, Heat Transfer Engineering, 28, 541-548.
28. Rodriguez, O.M.H., (2002). Interface Shape and Pressure Gradient in Upward Core-annular Flow. Ph.D.
thesis. State University of Campinas.
29. Bannwart, A. C. , Rodriguez, O. M. H. , de Carvalho, C. H. M., Wang I. S. and Obregon-Vara, R. M.,
(2004). Flow Patterns in Heavy Crude Oil-water Flow, Journal of Energy Resources Technology-
Transactions of the ASME, 126, 184-189.
30. Rodriguez, O.M.H. and Bannwart, A.C., (2008). Stability analysis of core-annular flow and neutral
stability wave number, AIChE J., 54, 20-31.

12