Modeling biofilm growth for porous media applications

As biofilms intervene in a porous medium, they affect the porosity and permeability, which in turn alters the hydrodynamics. Existing biofilm models do not sufficiently account for the effect of the small pore structure of the porous media on the biofilm growth to be suitable for such applications. A new biofilm growth model is presented which is suitable for microscale simulations of biofilm activity in a porous medium. Simulations from the model are presented which illustrate the feasibility of incorporating this biofilm growth model with a porous media hydrodynamics model.