Transport Rates of Adhering Liquid Films in Sheared Particle Beds

Wet granular materials show complex flow features and are key for numerous industrial processes such as mixing, drying, granulation, or hopper flows. The development of simple models to describe these flows as a continuum is still a challenging task.

Here we focus on a detailed simulation of the formation and rupture of liquid bridges in a sheared granular flow. Our ultimate goal is the establishment of a mesoscopic, continuum-based model for the effective liquid transfer rate. We use the Discrete Element Method (DEM), supplemented with a variety of microscopic liquid transfer models that model liquid transfer in a single particle-particle collision.

We present results for the transport of liquid through the particle bed by analyzing in detail the mode of liquid transfer (i.e., the conductive and convective flux of liquid). Finally we present correlations of the effective liquid flux with key flow parameters (e.g., the conductive stress and the collision frequency) to guide our development of a mesoscopic liquid transport model