Transport in Porous Media - Call for Papers for the Special Issue on Reactive Transport in Porous Materials: Current Trends and Challenges

Resulting from the workshop on Reactive transport in porous materials.

Guest Editors

Dr. Zhidong Zhang (ETH Zurich, Switzerland) email: zhidongz@ifb.baug.ethz.ch (this opens in a new tab)

Prof. Dr. Ueli Angst (ETH Zurich, Switzerland)

Prof. Dr.  Barbara Lothenbach (EMPA, Switzerland)

Prof. Dr. Burkan Isgor (Oregon State University, USA)

Reactive transport, accounting for advection, diffusion, dispersion, and a multitude of chemical reactions, is a common process in many porous media. Traditionally, the research of reactive transport is mainly carried out in geoscience. However, in recent decades, it has been expanded to different porous materials, such as woods, concretes, and biomaterials, which makes the field of reactive transport a highly multidisciplinary area. Even though the fundamental mechanisms and theories of reactive transport for different porous materials are similar, due to differences in the microstructure, physical properties, and chemical compositions, the aims of studying reactive transport in different porous materials significantly vary. For instance, transport of aggressive agents (e.g., chloride, sulfate) in concrete can react with hydration products and thus lead to material degradation or induce corrosion of steel. After steel corrosion, ion species can then transport and precipitate in the pore network and alter the microstructure. In nuclear waste repositories, chemicals in groundwater may penetrate the canister protection material, generally bentonite, while chemical reactions and self-swelling behavior change the properties of bentonite. Woods and biomaterials are sometimes used as functional materials to act as reaction reservoirs; therefore, fluid transport in these materials is the key to affecting the reaction efficiency. 

Because these distinct fields have evolved in different ways from one another, we create this Special Issue to bring researchers and engineers from different research disciplines and discuss current trends and challenges of reactive transport in their fields. Research papers include but are not limited to the following topics:

• Novel concepts, assumptions, and research methods on reactive transport in porous media 
• Experimental methods and results on determination of transport coefficients and chemical reactions 
• Multi-scale and multi-phase modelling on mass transport and chemical reactions 
• New computational methods to solve thermodynamic equilibrium and kinetics 
• Research methods on liquid-solid interactions during liquid transport 
• Research disciplines include but not limited to geoscience, cementitious materials, corrosion science, wood materials, and nuclear wastes storage

If you are interested to submit your contribution to this special issue kindly contact the Lead Guest Editor (Dr. Zhidong Zhang) first and share the abstract for viewing as first step.

Full paper submission deadline: August 31, 2022