TITLE:
Poroelastic Modelling of Gravitational Compaction
AUTHORS:
Pieter Broer van der Weg
KEYWORDS:
Poroelastic, Compaction, Consolidation, Gravity, Centrifuge, Sedimentation, Creaming, Subsidence, Emulsion, Dispersion
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Physical Chemistry,
Vol.9 No.3,
August
13,
2019
ABSTRACT: A
dynamic in-silico model captures the kinetics of 1-d gravity driven instabilities,
in gravity or centrifuge, of fluid-infiltrated poroelastic media in a partial
differential equation (pde). The pde yields the porosity profile over height and
time for the given initial and boundary conditions, during slow compaction in
counter-current fluid drainage. Processes captured are amongst others
sedimentation, creaming and subsidence. The most important limiting
prerequisite is that the incompressible dispersed medium is sufficiently
structured and/or concentrated that it compacts during slow drainage, without
segregation in sizes or in components. For Unilever, modeling of gravitational instability of products is important to
quantify or extrapolate long time behavior during shelf life or use centrifuge data to quickly predict long term shelf
performance of products.