TOWARDS THE COMPUTATION OF MULTIPHASE FLOWS OF DISCRETE PARTICLES IN VISCOELASTIC FLUIDS

The flow of multiphase systems comprising discrete particles in a continuous fluid is relevant in many applications, as are the processing of highly-filled polymer melts and of semi-solid conductive flow battery slurries, hydraulic fracturing operations that use solids-filled muds and the flow of biological fluids as blood, among many others. In several of these material systems the continuous medium is a viscoelastic fluid. Similarly, to what is happening in many fields, the availability of appropriate computational modelling tools is a key element to support any design activities. The most adequate way to model those multiphase systems is to follow Eulerian/Lagrangian approaches, in which the continuous medium is modelled in a Eulerian framework and the discrete particles are treated as Lagrangian entities. To accomplish these approaches, the interactions between the fluid and the particles demand appropriate drag models. The main long-term aim of this project is the development of a computational modelling framework able to cope with the flow of multiphase systems that comprise viscoelastic fluids and spherical particles.