Particle tracking velocimetry

Particle tracking velocimetry (PTV) is a velocimetry method i.e. a technique to measure velocities and trajectories of moving objects. In fluid mechanics research these objects are neutrally buoyant particles that are suspended in fluid flow. As the name suggests, individual particles are tracked, so this technique is a Lagrangian approach, in contrast to particle image velocimetry (PIV), which is an Eulerian method that measures the velocity of the fluid as it passes the observation point, that is fixed in space. There are two experimental PTV methods:

• the two-dimensional (2-D) PTV. Measurements are made in a 2-D slice, illuminated by a thin laser sheet (a thin plane); a low density of seeded particles allows for tracking each of them individually for several frames.
• the three-dimensional particle tracking velocimetry (3-D PTV) is a distinctive experimental technique originally developed to study fully turbulent flows. It is now being used widely in various disciplines, ranging from structural mechanics research to medicine and industrial environments. It is based on a multiple camera-system in a stereoscopic arrangement, three-dimensional illumination of an observation volume, recording of the time sequence of stereoscopic images of optical targets (flow tracers illuminated particles), determining their instantaneous 3-D position in space by use of photogrammetric techniques and tracking their movement in time, thus obtaining a set of 3-D trajectories of the optical targets. Time-resolved three-dimensional particle tracking velocimetry is known as 4D-PTV.