ABSTRACT
A highly viscous nature of heavy oil poses challenges to transportation leading to costly operation and difficult processing. Traditional methods of upgrading unconventional hydrocarbon sources involve catalytic and thermal upgrading and these methods require high temperature and pressure. In the present study, partial upgrading of heavy hydrocarbon is studied by using cavitation and the stimulator. Cavitation is a phenomenon comprising of formation, growth and collapse of bubbles in a liquid medium. The most well-known disruptive effect of cavitation occurs during the collapse phase of bubbles. Method of inducing cavitation involves transmitting 20 kHz of ultrasound through an ultrasonic horn. A model molecule used in this study is n-hexadecane (C16). The experiments were carried out at 230 °C, atmospheric pressure and 60 min time scale. The results indicated that the conversion of n-hexadecane into R1 fraction (