Upscaling nonlinear adsorption in periodic porous media – homogenization approach

Abstract

We consider the homogenization of a model of reactive flows through periodic porous media involving a single solute which can be absorbed and desorbed on the pore boundaries. This is a system of two convection–diffusion equations, one in the bulk and one on the pore boundaries, coupled by an exchange reaction term. The novelty of our work is to consider a nonlinear reaction term, a so-called Langmuir isotherm, in an asymptotic regime of strong convection. We therefore generalize previous works on a similar linear model. Under a technical assumption of equal drift velocities in the bulk and on the pore boundaries, we obtain a nonlinear monotone diffusion equation as the homogenized model. Our main technical tool is the method of two-scale convergence with drift.