Insights into poroelastic media flow

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Poroelastic materials consist of an elastic porous solid with fluid-filled pores, and in general this solid can show viscoelastic properties. Fluid flow in the porous matrix and deformation of this matrix are inherently coupled. We have recently developed a technique for measuring the strain field inside a poroeleastic material such as biological tissue with high spatial and temporal resolution. Other work typically performs macroscopic experiments on poroelastic materials and uses these results to identify parameters for lumped parameter models, analytical models or finite element analysis models of these materials. These models include assumptions for the description of the solid phase and for the permeability of the solid matrix as a function of strain or porosity. These models are difficult to validate as it is difficult to characterize the solid matrix independently for most materials.    In the long term, this research program will develop expertise in the characterization, modelling and the design of poroelastic materials for applications in diverse areas such as biotechnology, robotics and the environment. Within the next 5 years of this research program we will develop methods to create poroelastic materials with tunable properties, and we will develop methods for the characterization of the individual components and the combined poroelastic materials including an adaptation of our strain field measurement method to these artificial materials. We will apply these tools to verify common poroelastic models and characterization methods, where we can compare the identified model parameters to independently measured material properties. The measured strain fields will help us understand the underlying physics at the microscopic level. We will also apply these tools to help elucidate phenomena reported in the literature that are still missing a generally agreed-on explanation such as the hysteretic behaviour of the flow resistance of a compacted poroelastic material for an increasing and decreasing flow rate. The findings of these studies will be applied to initial work on biological tissue samples (excised pig skin).    The projects planned for this grant will involve 2 PhD students, 3 MASc students and 6 undergraduate students over the next 5 years of this program. These HQP will be selected following equitable hiring practices to allow for continued diversity in my team with demonstrated positive impact on innovations in our research. Beyond increasing our understanding of poroelastic materials, the proposed work will open new opportunities to expand this research program toward application areas such tissue engineering, filtration technology and human-robot interaction.