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Modeling the pore structure of porous media
Author(s) -
Farrell D. A.,
Larson W. E.
Publication year - 1972
Publication title -
water resources research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.863
H-Index - 217
eISSN - 1944-7973
pISSN - 0043-1397
DOI - 10.1029/wr008i003p00699
Subject(s) - porous medium , hydraulic conductivity , characterisation of pore space in soil , porosity , anisotropy , materials science , conductivity , geotechnical engineering , saturation (graph theory) , degree of saturation , mechanics , geology , soil water , soil science , mathematics , physics , quantum mechanics , combinatorics
A physicomathematical alternative to capillaric modeling of the pore structure of porous media is proposed. With this model, the hydraulic conductivity of porous materials is determined from a ‘pore domain’ characterization of the pore space by using an appropriate conductance theory for estimating the flux contribution of the various components of heterogeneous media. The proposed model is versatile yet mathematically tractable and is capable of analyzing fluid flow through porous materials of widely differing structure including anisotropic and structured media. A comparative study of the predictions of this model with those of a model proposed by E. C. Childs and N. Collis‐George and now widely used in soil science is made for several media. The findings indicate that indiscriminate use of the latter model may be responsible for the gross overpredictions of hydraulic conductivity for some porous materials and also for the reported distortions in the relationships between conductivity and the degree of saturation for some soils.