Fluid Flow with Suspended Soft Particles in Porous Media*

Transport of soft particles with flow in porous media is ubiquitous in many natural and engineering processes. For example, preformed-particle-gel (PPG) treatment is a common technique in enhanced oil recovery. While the measurable properties in this process are at the microscale, such as gel size, properties, and the macroscopic permeability directly correlates with the overall recovery efficiency. Therefore, it is desirable to find the quantitative relation between the macroscopic permeability and the relevant microscopic properties. However, this remains an unsolved problem. In this work, we study transport of mono-dispersed suspended soft particles in porous media. We start from analyzing a soft particle transport through a single pore throat and find the correlation between injection pressure and the properties of the soft particle. Based on this result, we then expand the analysis to macroscale. we find a quantitative relation between the macroscopic permeability and pore-scale properties in the presence of pore blockage. The work significantly improves our understanding on transport of soft particles in porous media and directly benefits the relevant industrial applications.