Simulation-based optimization of a vector showerhead system for the control of flow field profile in a vertical reactor chamber

Optimization of a vector showerhead in a vertical reactor involves thousands of holes on the showerhead face plate and the spatial distribution of physical fields, so parameterizing the geometry configuration of the holes in high resolution is very difficult, which makes the conventional optimization methods hard to deal with. To solve this problem, a profile error feedback (PEF) optimization solution was proposed to optimize a vector showerhead gas delivery system for the control of mass transport. The gas velocity profile in the reactor and the continuous-feature impedance distribution profile on the showerhead face plate are defined as design objective and variables, respectively. A cyclic iterative approximation idea was implemented in this solution. The algorithm was started from a guessed initial design model and then cyclically adjusted the design variables by the constructed PEF iterative formula to generate a better model and to make the gas velocity profile in the critical domain of the new model continually approximate to the expected profile, until it could be accepted. Finally, the optimized impedance profile was mapped to the holes geometry configuration through the established equivalent impedance model for the showerhead face plate.