Visualization of Fluid Flow in Porous Media

Summary:

We are computing fluid flow through porous media using the Lattice Boltzmann method. In the Lattice Boltzmann method particles are allowed to move and collide on a lattice.  The rules governing the collisions are designed such that the time-average motion of the particles is consistent with the Navier-Stokes equations.    The Lattice Boltzman method has multiple advantages including:

• its time and space efficient computations that are straightforward to parallelize,
• it handles complex boundaries without difficulty, and
• it directly links microscopic and macroscopic phenomena.

Visualization helps develop a conceptual framework for understanding complex physical processes. In particular with fluid flow, visual comparisons with experiment are important to validate models.   

The visualizations were created using a variety of standard scientific visualization techniques and software.  The two-dimensional images were created by taking a cross-section of of the three-dimensional model and mapping fluid density to color and intensity.   

In the three-dimensional images, fluids are depicted with isosurfaces and volume visualization techniques using color, intensity, and transparency to indicate fluid density.  Fluid movement is expressed by assembling visualizations at a series of time steps into animations.  The three-dimensional images also use isosurfaces to delineate the structure of the medium such as the sandstone, or the surface of the tube structure within which the fluid flow is being modeled.   

Staff:

• Collaborating Scientist: Nick Martys
• Parallel Computing: John Hagedorn
• Visualization: John Hagedorn
• Group Leader: Judith Terrill

Links:

• Parallelization of the Lattice Boltzmann Method

Publications:

• Y. Son, N. S. Martys, J. G. Hagedorn and K. Migler, Suppression of Capillary Instability of a Polymeric Thread via Parallel Plate Confinement, Macromolecules, 36, 2003, pp. 5825-5833.

• N. S. Martys and J. G. Hagedorn, Multiscale modeling of fluid transport in heterogeous materials using descrete Boltzmann methods, Materials and Structures, 35, December 2002, pp. 650-659.

• N. S. Martys and J. F. Douglas, Critical Properties and Phase Separation in Lattice Boltzmann Fluid Mixture, Physical Review E, 63, 031205, February 2001.

• E. Landis, S. Lu, N. Martys and J. Hagedorn, Experiments and Simulations of Concrete Microstructure Permeability, delivered at Symposium on Materials Science of High Performance Concrete, November 2000.

• J. Hagedorn, N. Martys, D. Goujon and J. Devaney, A Parallel Lattice Boltzmann Algorithm for Fluid Flow in Complex Geometries delivered at Symposium on Computational Advances in Modeling Heterogeneous Materials, Fifth National Congress on Computational Mechanics, August 1999.

• N. Martys, J. Hagedorn, D. Goujon and J. Devaney, Large Scale Simulations of Single and Multi-Component Flow in Porous Media in Proceedings of SPIE: The International Symposium on Optical Science, Engineering, and Instrumentation, Denver, Colorado, July 1999.