Simulation of an Avalanche in a Fluid with a Soft-Sphere/Immersed Boundary Method Including a Lubrication Force

The present work aims at reproducing the local dynamics of a dense granular media evolving in a viscous fluid from the grain scale to that of thousands of grains, encountered in environmental multiphase flows. To this end a soft-sphere collision/immersed-boundary method is developed. The methods are validated alone through various standard configurations including static and dynamical situations. Then, simulations of binary wall-particle collisions in a fluid are performed for a wide range of Stokes number ranging in [10−1, 104]. Good agreement with available experimental data is found provided that a local lubrication model is used. Finally, three- dimensional simulations of gravity/shear-driven dense granular flows in a viscous fluid are presented. The results open the way for a parametric study in the parameter space initial aspect ratio-initial packing.