Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

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Powder Technology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/powtec

Fluid-solid interaction simulation for particles and walls of arbitrary

polygonal shapes with a coupled LBM-IMB-DEM method
Xingang Li a, Fangzhou Wang a, Duo Zhang b, Sai Gu b,⁎, Xin Gao a,⁎
a
School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, National Engineering Research Center of Distillation Technology, Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering (Tianjin),
Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
b
Department of Chemical and Process Engineering, University of Surrey, Guildford GU2 7XH, United Kingdom

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: To achieve simulating the fluid-solid systems which consist of irregular polygonal particles and walls, an im-
Received 10 June 2019 proved and extended LBM-IMB-DEM model has been developed. The method couples the Lattice Boltzmann
Received in revised form 30 July 2019 Method (LBM) for fluid flow calculation, the polygonal Discrete Element Method (DEM) for particle-particle
Accepted 7 August 2019
and particle-wall interactions computation, and the Immersed Moving Boundary (IMB) scheme for fluid-solid in-
Available online 12 August 2019
teractions calculation. The Convex Decomposition method is proposed as an extension of polygonal DEM, which
Keywords:
successfully expands the applied range to arbitrary polygons. A series of optimization algorithms and flowchart
Lattice Boltzmann method designs are adopted, including the improved progressive scanning algorithm and the proposed solid volume frac-
Discrete element method tion fast algorithm, which can effectively increase the computational efficiency. The model is comprehensively
Immersed moving boundary validated by performing several verification simulations, the results of which are consistent with the existing lit-
CFD erature and theoretical data. The simulation of the representative engineering process, clean bed filtration of ir-
Non-spherical particulate system regular airborne particles in porous media, is then accomplished as the application test. The results have proved
Filtration that the proposed LBM-IMB-DEM is a promising model which has satisfactory adaptability and computational ef-
ficiency for simulating complex fluid-solid systems, which will help complement the experimental research into
such multiphase systems.
© 2019 Published by Elsevier B.V.

1. Introduction
Particles moving in fluids are commonly encountered in natural and
engineering applications. Most of the particles are generally of irregular
shapes instead of spherical or elliptical. Chemical industrial processes
often involve large amounts of irregular particles interacting with fluid
flow, moving walls (mechanical devices) and walls of complex structure
(porous media), all of which make the simulating of this complex solid-
liquid system require huge computational cost and lots of attention to
implementation details of simulation, for example dynamic mesh draw-
ing and mesh quality check.
The discrete element method (DEM) is widely used for dealing with
the behaviour of bulk solids. Coupling DEM with Computational Fluid
Dynamics (CFD) methods has drawn considerable interest for recent
decades. DEM has been coupled with some CFD methods successfully
[1] such as the solvers depending on the Navier-Stokes equations: Finite
Element Method (FEM) [2], Level Set Method (LSM) [3] and Particle
FEM (PFEM) [4]. However, these methods have some absence of details
at the pore scale which is a noticeable drawback for simulating particles
and walls with complex shapes.
⁎ Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: sai.gu@surrey.ac.uk (S. Gu), gaoxin@tju.edu.cn (X. Gao).
The Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) has been proved successful in
simulating complex fluid flows, and coupling LBM with DEM then be-
come a popular field. Noble and Torczynski [5] proposed the Immersed
Moving Boundary (IMB) method for determining the numerical bound-
ary of solid particles, which overcame the problems of earlier LBM
works where the boundary intersection handling was too coarse [6,7].
IMB method utilises solid volume fraction of each LBM lattice cell cov-
ered by the particles to calculate the fluid-solid interaction force. By in-
troducing the solid volume fraction, the surface curve and details are
treated smoothly when the no-slip boundary condition is satisfied.
Other approaches [8,9] for LBM-DEM coupling has also been suggested
on the basis of the Immersed Boundary Method (IBM). In recent year,
Tan et al. [10], Owen et al. [11] and other researches [12,13] are focused
on improving these schemes.
The LBM-DEM has been used previously in two or three dimensions,
also with various particle shapes such as spherical, ellipsoidal and
super-quadrics, as well as particles which are made from a combination
of multiple of such shapes called glued sphere model in DEM [1,14].
However, this method has been limited to convex shapes so far. So
most of the simulation cases in above researches were based on circular
or oval particles with simplified processes. Galindo-Torres [15] pro-
posed an effective LBM-IMB-DEM model for general shapes and tested
with partially simplified simulation setups. In this paper, an improved

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.powtec.2019.08.006
0032-5910/© 2019 Published by Elsevier B.V.
178 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

LBM-IMB-DEM method based on the model proposed by Galindo-

Torres [15] is introduced to incorporate non-spherical particulate sys-
tem where solid phases of arbitrary irregular polygonal shapes are
involved. The advantage of this model lies on its capability to treat arbi-
trary polygon of the solid phase with the proposed Convex Decomposi-
tion method as well as its efficiency with a series of optimization
algorithms and flowchart designs.
This work aims to simulate the two-dimensional fluid-solid interac-
tion with large quantities of irregular polygon particles and walls in
chemical engineering applications, while keeping the model adaptable
and efficient. We utilise the LBM for fluid flow computation. The polyg-
onal DEM with Convex Decomposition method for simulating particles
and walls of arbitrary polygon shapes. The IMB scheme requires recalcu-
lation of the Lagrangian point at each time step, which makes the IMB
more time-consuming than IBM [1]. However, the IMB method uses
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of collision between two convex polygon particles.
the solid volume fraction as the description method of the solid phase
boundary [5], which is more convenient to couple with the Convex De-
composition method proposed than IBM. Therefore, this paper adopts
with Y2D being the two-dimensional Young's modulus. l is the length
the IMB scheme and, at the same time, makes efforts to reduce the com-
factor. The direction of the elastic force, n, is regarded as the weighted
putation of the IMB. We proposed solid volume fraction fast algorithm
average of vectors n1 and n2 as shown in Fig. 2:
and adopted the progressive scanning algorithm for the optimization
of IMB and LBM modules. The simulation program is written from n1 kðC; S1 Þk þ n2 kðC; S2 Þk
scratch in the MATLAB® environment and now consists of more than n¼ ð5Þ
kðC; S1 Þk þ kðC; S2 Þk
15,000 lines of code.
The paper has the following organisation: Section 2 introduces the
The normal damping force shares the same direction n as the elastic
LBM, DEM, IMB scheme and the Convex Decomposition method sepa-
force, and the damping force can be obtained by.
rately. Section 3 describes the program design, the progressive scanning
algorithm and solid volume fraction fast algorithm. In Section 4, the ver- pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi Aðt−τDEM Þ−Aðt Þ  m1 m2

ification of LBM-IMB-DEM model is executed. Section 5 presents an F dam ¼ −D Y 2D m  m ¼ ð6Þ
lτDEM m1 þ m2
application test where the clean bed filtration of irregular airborne par-
ticles in porous media is simulated. Finally, it ends with the conclusions
where D is the damping coefficient, m ∗ represents the reduced mass
and projections on future works in Section 6.
which can be calculated by the mass of contacting particles (m1, m2),
τDEM is the DEM time step.
2. The method
The friction is given by the Coulomb friction model:
The coupled method of LBM-IMB-DEM framework adopted in our 
δ_t K t jδt j; jK t δt j≤ μ F ela
study and the proposed Convex Decomposition method will be intro- F fri ¼ −  ð7Þ
duced in this section: Particle-particle and particle-wall interactions δ_t  μ F ela ; jK t δt j N μ F ela
are achieved through Polygonal DEM with Convex Decomposition mod-
ification. The fluid flow and fluid-solid interaction are calculated by LBM δt ¼ δ_ t ∙ τDEM þ δt−τDEM ð8Þ
and IMB scheme sequentially.

2.1. Convex polygonal DEM
This study adopts the DEM for convex polygonal particles organised
by Matuttis and Chen [16]. The translation and rotation of particle are
determined by Newton's second law based on the acting force Fc and
torque Tc:
F c ¼ F ela þ F dam þ F fri þ F hyd
where δt and δ_t are the accumulated tangential sliding distance and tan-
gential sliding velocity, Kt corresponds to tangential stiffness, μ is the
friction coefficient.
A second-order backward difference formulae (BDF2) solver is used
to solve Newton's second law formula. The BDF2 solver provides high
precision in the position's computation and great stability for particle
heaps simulation. The results of previous researches show that the
ð1Þ BDF2 solver stays stable when the collision is resolved with five or

T c ¼ r  F c þ T hyd ð2Þ

where Fela and Fdam are the elastic force and the damping force respec-
tively, Ffri is the friction, Fhyd and Thyd are the hydrodynamic force and
torque solved by IMB scheme (see Section 2.4), and r is the vector
from the particle's mass centre to the force point.
The elastic force between polygon particle depends on the overlap-
ping geometry of the contact. Fig. 1 shows the normal case where two
convex polygons intersect and the magnitude of the elastic force is pro-
portional to the area A of overlap between the two particles:

j F ela j ¼ Y 2D A=l ð3Þ

4r1 r 2
l¼ ðr 1 ¼ kr1 k; r 2 ¼ kr2 kÞ ð4Þ Fig. 2. Calculation of the direction of elastic force based on overlap polygon: C is the mass
r1 þ r2 centre of the overlap polygon; S1 and S2 are the intersection points.
 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192
Fig. 3. The Convex Decomposition method's processing of the two-dimensional outer contour of different objects.
more time steps [16], which is the principle for determining the DEM
time step in this study.
2.2. Convex decomposition method
In order to simulate the particles and walls of arbitrary polygon
shapes including convex and concave, we propose the Convex Decom-
position method as an effective modification of the current polygonal
DEM.
The two-dimensional outer contour of most objects can be reduced
to a polygon, which can be further decomposed into a combination of
several small convex polygons. So, with the Convex Decomposition
method, all the concave and irregular polygonal particles' outer contour
are handled as the combination of a certain number of convex DEM
polygons attaching to each other, as presented in Fig. 3, which are called
combined particles.
For the objects with complicated outer contours, the Convex Decom-
position method can be accomplished by increasing the number of con-
stituent polygons with reduced area. In the air filtration simulation in
Section 5, a stack of large amounts of convex constituent polygons is
used to emulate the filter material with porous structure. In addition,
the circular or elliptical objects can be represented by the polygons
with more edges, for example, a hexadecagon is used as the substitution
of a circular particle in Section 4.2. For the cases where large amounts of
particles are involved and the requirement for the shape fidelity is rela-
tively low, decreasing the amount of constituent polygons while in-
creasing the corresponding edge number can effectively reduce the
computation and capture the shape characteristics at the same time.
The force and torque acted on the combined particle is the resultant
force and torque of all constituent particles. The acting forces on
Fig. 4. Convex Decomposition method: force analysis of three combined particles
contacting with each other (overlap polygons are exaggerated).
179
constituent particles are computed separately, as shown in Fig. 4. The
BDF2 solver computes the acceleration, velocity, displacement and posi-
tion of the combined particle in the main loop.
Taking the leftmost green combined particle in Fig. 5 as example, the
acting force Fs (F1, F2, F3) on each constituent particle is determined by
the polygonal DEM introduced in Section 2.1. The calculation formulas
for the external force Fcomb and external torque Tcomb on the green com-
bined particle are as follows:
X
F comb ¼ Fs ð9Þ
X
T comb ¼ rcs  F s ð10Þ
where rcs is the direction vector pointing from Ccomb (combined
particle's centre of mass) towards the centroid of each overlap polygon.
The coordinates of Ccomb equal to the mass weighted average of the con-
stituent particles' centroids Cs:
P
C ∙ ms
C comb ¼ Ps ð11Þ
ms
where ms is the mass of constituent particle.
It should be noted that the combined particle's mass moment of in-
ertia is obtained by the Parallel axis theorem:
X 
Icomb ¼ Is þ ms ds
2
ð12Þ
where Icomb is the combined particle's moment of inertia. Is and m are
the moment of inertia and the mass of the constituent particle respec-
tively. ds is the distance between Ccomb and the mass centre of constitu-
ent particle.
Theoretically, there will be various ways of the convex decompo-
sition for the same polygon. Fig. 5 illustrates two different decompo-
sition approaches for the concave polygon: (a) one quadrangle, one
pentagon and one hexagon; (b) nine triangles. If the corners of poly-
gon are divided, as shown in the red wireframes of Fig. 5 (b), DEM
collision calculations at these corners will also be divided, which
will increase the total amount of computation and calculation
error. So, the principle for the decomposition method is to introduce
Fig. 5. Two different decomposition approaches for the concave polygon.
180 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

as few constituent particles as possible and to avoid splitting the

protruding corners. The decomposition approach in Fig. 5 (a) is rec-
ommended and adopted in this study.

2.3. Lattice Boltzmann method

For the present study, a widely used incompressible Lattice Boltzm-

ann D2Q9 scheme with a single relaxation time approximation and the
Bhatnagar-Gross-Krook (BGK) scheme are adopted.
The fluid domain is divided into a certain number of square lattices
with side h, and each lattice node has a set of probability distribution
function fi which is the primary variable of Lattice Boltzmann formula-
tion and represents the probability of finding fluid particles within
nine discrete velocities ei:

f i ðx þ ei Δt; t þ Δt Þ−f i ðx; t Þ ¼ Ω ð13Þ

Discrete velocity vectors are defined as:

8
>
> ð0; 0Þ ð i ¼ 0Þ
>
>
>
>  
>
< C cosπði−1Þ ; sinπ ði−1Þ ð i ¼ 1; …; 4Þ
ei ¼ 2 2 ð14Þ
>
>
>
>  
>
> πð2i−9Þ πð2i−9Þ
>
: C cos ; sin ð i ¼ 5; …; 8Þ
4 4

where Ω is the collision operator which is determined by the dimen- Fig. 6. IMB lattice node classification and the definition of solid volume fraction ε.
sionless relaxation time τ and the equilibrium distribution functions feq
i :

Δt eq

Ω¼− f ðx; t Þ− f i ðx; t Þ ð15Þ moving particles. As shown in Fig. 6, IMB scheme classifies the LBM lat-
τ i
tice nodes into four types. The solid volume fraction ε of lattice node
 
eq 3 9 3 equals to the area ratio occupied by the solid phase, which is the
f i ðx; t Þ ¼ ωi ρ 1 þ 2 ei ∙v þ 4 ðei ∙vÞ2 − 2 v∙v ði ¼ 0; …; 8Þ ð16Þ
C 2C 2C most important variable in IMB scheme. The solid volume fraction de-
termines the weighting function B directly:
4
where ω i is the weighting coefficient with fixed values ( ω0 ¼ ,
9 εðτ−0:5Þ
1 1 B¼ ð22Þ
ω1;2;3;4 ¼ , ω5;6;7;8 ¼ ), and C is the lattice speed and has the ð1−εÞ þ ðτ−0:5Þ
9 36
relationship to lattice length, h, and LBM time step (Δt):
In the IMB scheme, LBM's standard collision operator in Eq. (15) is
C ¼ h=Δt ð17Þ modified as

Δt

The macroscopic fluid density ρ, velocity v and pressure P at each lat- eq

Ω ¼ − ð1−BÞ f i ðx; t Þ− f i ðx; t Þ þ BΩsi ð23Þ
tice node can be solved by: τ

X
8 where an additional collision term, Ωsi , is introduced to realise the effect
ρ¼ fi ð18Þ of particle motion on fluid flow:
i¼0
eq eq
Ωsi ¼ f −i ðx; t Þ−f i ðx; t Þ þ f i ðρ; U s Þ−f −i ðρ; uÞ ð24Þ
X
8
ρv ¼ f i ei ð19Þ
i¼0 where sub-symbol −i stands for the opposite direction of i. Us is the
velocity of solid lattice node at time t + Δt which depends on the
 
C 2 particle translational velocity Up, the particle angular velocity ω as
P¼ pffiffiffi ρ ð20Þ
3 well as the position of the centre of mass (x c , yc), as illustrated in
Fig. 6. Us is given by
Moreover, the macroscopic fluid kinetic viscosity ν and the dimen-  qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
sionless relaxation time τ has the following relationship which is used
U s ¼ U p þ ω  lc lc ¼ ðx−xc Þ2 þ ðy−yc Þ2 ð25Þ
to calculate the LBM time step Δt:

2
h The total hydrodynamic force Fhyd on DEM particle is considered as
ν ¼ ðτ − 0:5Þ ð21Þ
3Δt the summation of the change of momentum on fluid and solid boundary
nodes that the particle covers:

2.4. The coupled method " !#

X X
F hyd ¼ Ch Bn Ωsi ei ð26Þ
Immersed Moving Boundary (IMB) scheme proposed by Noble and n i

Torczynski [5] is adopted to solve the modified bounce back rule for
 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192
The torque Thyd is solved with a similar method:
( " !#)
X X
T hyd ¼ Ch ðx−xc Þ  Bn Ωsi ei
n i
3. Programming and algorithm optimization
In this section, innovative flowchart designs and optimization algo-
rithms are proposed to achieve the following targets: [1] To add the
Convex Decomposition method to the simulation program, which is
theoretically capable of handling any irregular 2D polygonal shapes;
[2] To extend the application range of the LBM-IMB-DEM model by
supporting walls with complex porous structures as well as moving
walls; [3] To introduce optimization algorithms reducing the amount
of computation, as the coupling between LBM and DEM modules has a
huge computational demand.
For the first two targets, we introduced an improved LBM-IMB-DEM
computational sequence and a modified DEM module design in Appen-
dix A. And for the third target, we adopted two optimization algorithms
for LBM lattice node classification and solid volume fraction calculation
(see in Sections 3.1 and 3.2), both of which are specially designed for the
IMB scheme and the polygonal DEM.
Fig. 7. The progressive scanning algorithm for LBM lattice node classification.
181
3.1. LBM lattice node classification
Scanning algorithm has been used in LBM calculation [17], and on
the basis of the existing algorithm, the characteristics of polygons are
ð27Þ
utilized to reduce the computational cost of node position judgment.
Node classification in the program is built as a pre-preparation module
for solid volume fraction calculation. As introduced in Section 2.4, there
are four types of lattice nodes in the IMB scheme: solid boundary node,
interior solid node, fluid boundary node, and fluid node. For the fluid
node and the internal solid node, the solid volume fraction ε are 0 and
1, respectively, which do not need to be calculated. Therefore, the LBM
lattice node update strategy is: Use the improved “progressive scanning
algorithm” to quickly determine the node classification, and then only
calculate ε of the fluid and solid boundary nodes with the proposed
“solid volume fraction fast algorithm” (see in Section 3.2). Fig. 7 illus-
trates the progressive scanning algorithm. The process steps are as
follows:
1) By default, all lattice nodes are set as fluid nodes with ε being zero.
2) Read the bounding box of the current particle, as shown by the green
wire frame in Fig. 7 (a). Determine the nodes occupied by the
bounding box and extend the nodes outwards by one grid (the
brown lattice region in Fig. 7 (a)). This area is the calculation area.
Number all rows and columns in the calculation area.
3) Determine the node classification starting from row a to row m. The
scanning of each line consists of the horizontal forward scanning and
backward scanning:
4) Horizontal forward scanning. In the case of the row d in Fig. 7 (b), the
forward scanning starts from the node d1. Connect d1 with the parti-
cle centroid C, and judge the intersection of Cd1 with all particle
edges (red lines in Fig. 7 (b)). If there is an intersection (i.e., the
edge B1 intersects with Cd1), proceed to the node d2 and judge the in-
tersection of Cd2 with all particle edges. If there is no intersection, it
can be determined that the first “no intersection node” (i.e., d2) that
appears in a single forward scanning is the solid boundary node can-
didate, and the previous node involved (i.e., d1) is the fluid boundary
node candidate. The particle edges associated with the boundary
nodes are recorded correspondingly (i.e., both d1 and d2 are associ-
ated with B1). The forward scanning ends.
5) Horizontal backward scanning. In the case of the row d in Fig. 7 (b),
backward scanning starts from the node d10. Similar to step [4],
judged whether or not particle edges intersect with Cd10. If inter-
sects, move the intersection judgment sequentially to node d9, d8,
and d7. When it is judged that Cd7 does not intersects with any
edge, the first “no intersection node” (i.e., d7) in the backward scan-
ning is recorded as the solid boundary node candidate, and previous
node involved (i.e., d8) is the fluid boundary node candidate. The
particle edges associated with the boundary nodes are recorded cor-
respondingly (i.e., both d7 and d8 are associated with B3). The back-
ward scanning ends.
6) After the horizontal progressive scanning from row a to row m, col-
umn 1 to column 10 are then scanned vertically with the same
method as steps [4] and [5]. Taking column 5 as an example, the ver-
tical forward scanning direction is from node a5 to m5, while the ver-
tical backward scanning starts from node m5 to a5.
7) In steps [4] to [6], all lattice nodes that have not participated in the
intersection judgment are judged as interior solid nodes.
8) Return to step [2] and continue to the next particle.
It should be noted that only candidates for boundary nodes are clas-
sified through the above steps. If the calculated ε of these candidate
nodes equal to 1 or 0, they will be classified to interior solid nodes or
fluid node. Progressive scanning algorithm can greatly reduce the com-
putation of the node classification. For example, the classification of 10
nodes in the row d only calculate the intersection of 6 sets of line
segment.
182 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192
As for judging the intersection between line segments a1a2 and b1b2,
this paper adopts the fast intersection judgment algorithm:
Ints1 ¼ Vecp ða1 b1 ; a1 b2 Þ ∙ Vecp ða2 b1 ; a2 b2 Þ
Ints2 ¼ Vecp ðb1 a1 ; b1 a2 Þ ∙ Vecp ðb2 a1 ; b2 a2 Þ
Vecp ðx; yÞ ¼ xð1Þ ∙ yð2Þ−yð1Þ ∙ xð2Þ
where Ints1 and Ints2 are the judgment numbers. When both Ints1 and
Ints2 are less than or equal to zero, line segments intersect.
Using the above algorithm, intersection judgment of two line seg-
ments can be finished with 10 multiplications and 4 subtractions,
which requires small amount of computations. The fast intersection
judgment algorithm is packaged as an independent MATLAB® custom
function, and all the calculations involving the intersection judgment
will call this function.
Fig. 8. Calculation of solid volume fraction for various boundary nodes.
3.2. Fast solid volume fraction calculation
This section will introduce the “solid volume fraction fast algorithm”
which is proposed for the polygonal DEM and designed compatible with
ð28Þ the Convex Decomposition method.
Fig. 8 shows the calculation of the solid volume fraction ε of various
boundary nodes. L represents the target node. Fig. 8 (a) to (d) are solid
ð29Þ boundary nodes, while Fig. 8 (e) to (g) are fluid boundary nodes. Square
A1A2A3A4 is the node's region. The red lines indicate the edges of the par-
ticle, and the intersection points between the particle edges and the
ð30Þ
boundary of the node's region are marked as R1, R2, …, Rn. The grey
part is the area covered by the solid phase (called the solid phase poly-
gon). The red points are the vertexes of the solid phase polygon.
Taking the case shown in Fig. 8 (d) as example, process steps of the
solid volume fraction fast algorithm for solid boundary nodes and candi-
dates are as follows:
1) Read the particle edges associated with the boundary nodes re-
corded in the progressive scanning algorithm (see in Section 3.1).
Solve the intersections R1 and R2. If no intersection occurs, L is classi-
fied as interior solid node and ε is 1.
 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192
Fig. 9. Settings of the flow pasting a rectangle polygon simulation.
2) Compute the intersection of the two particle edges. If the inter-
section point is within the node's region, record it as R3. Record
the above R1, R2, …, R n as the vertexes of the solid phase
polygon.
Fig. 10. Results of the flow past a rectangle polygon simulation: (a) Computed drag
coefficient vs. Reynolds number for steady flow; (b) Computed recirculation length vs.
Reynolds number.
183
3) Judge whether LA1, LA2, LA3, LA4 intersect with R1R3 and R2R3 in se-
quence. If LAn does not intersect with R1R3 or R2R3, record An as the
vertex of the solid phase polygon (i.e., A2 and A3 in Fig. 8 (d)).
4) The area of the solid phase polygon is calculated by its vertexes
R1R3R2A2A3 obtained in the steps [1] to [3]. ε equals to the area
ratio of the solid phase polygon to the node's region.
Similarly, taking the case shown in Fig. 8 (g) as example, process
steps for fluid boundary nodes and candidates are as follows:
1) Read the particle edges associated with the boundary nodes re-
corded in the progressive scanning algorithm (see in Section 3.1).
Solve the intersections R1 and R2. If no intersection occurs, L is classi-
fied as fluid node and ε is 0.
2) Compute the intersection of the two particle edges. If the intersec-
tion point is within the node's region, record it as R3. Record the
above R1, R2, …, Rn as the vertexes of the solid phase polygon.
3) Judge whether LA1, LA2, LA3, LA4 intersect with R1R3 and R2R3 in se-
quence. If LAn intersects with R1R3 or R2R3, record An as the vertex
of the solid phase polygon (i.e., A2 and A3 in Fig. 8 (g)).
4) If LAn intersects with two particle edges (i.e., LA4 in Fig. 8 (f)), An is
not recorded as the vertex of the solid phase polygon.
5) The area of the solid phase polygon is calculated by its vertexes
R1R3R2A2A3 obtained in the steps [1] to [4]. ε equals to the area
ratio of the solid phase polygon to the node's region.
Fig. 11. The particle sedimentation simulation. (a) Simulation settings; (b) The setup of
dodecagon particle with the Convex Decomposition modification.
184 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

It should be noted that the above algorithm does not support the
case where more than one particle vertexes appear in the node's region,
as shown in Fig. 8 (h). However, in the actual simulation, the lattice
spacing will be much smaller than the particle side length in order to ef-
fectively capture the shape characteristics of the particle, so the cases in
Fig. 8 (h) is very rare and currently not considered.
In traditional algorithms, in order to calculate the area of the solid
phase polygon, inverse trigonometric functions must be used to de-
termine the anticlockwise order of the vertexes [17]. As complex
MATLAB® functions, trigonometric functions have higher computa-
tional cost than the fast intersection judgment algorithm in
Section 3.1 (as well as several logical judgment) [18]. After replacing
the traditional algorithm with the proposed solid volume fraction
fast algorithm, the running time of the 10,000-node solid volume
fraction calculation test was shortened by about 94%. Therefore,
the solid volume fraction fast algorithm can effectively reduce calcu-
lating amount of the LBM module.

4. Model validation

This section provides a step-by-step verification of the LBM-IMB-

DEM model presented in Section 2 and the simulation program built

Fig. 13. The free collision of DEM particles. (a) Simulation settings of one original group;
(b) The setup of particles in the corresponding comparative group.

in Section 3. The accuracy and reliability of the LBM-IMB coupled

scheme which is responsible for fluid mechanics simulation will be val-
idated in Sections 4.1 and 4.2. Section 4.3 will verify the stability of pure
DEM calculation. The effects of the proposed Convex Decomposition
method on the accuracy and computation efficiency will also be tested.

4.1. Flow past a rectangle polygon

This section will simulate the classic case—flow pasting the rectan-
gular obstacle. We calculate the drag coefficient and the recirculation
length corresponding to different Reynolds numbers, and compare the
results with the existing literature data. The LBM-IMB coupled scheme
for immersed polygonal obstacles is validated.
As shown in Fig. 9, one square polygon obstacle (with the side length
of 0.1025 m) was placed at the centre of a channel. The height and
length of the channel are 0.82 m and 3.07 m respectively, which leads
to a blockage ratio B = 1/8. Periodic boundaries were applied to the
channel's inlet and outlet. The fluid domain is formed by a 614 × 164 lat-
tice with the lattice spacing h = 0.005 m. The relaxation time τ = 0.55.
The fluid kinetic viscosity ν is taken as 1.0 × 10−4 m2/s, and the fluid
density ρ is 103 kg/m3.

Table 1
Parameters of the DEM particle free collision simulation.

Parameter Value
3
Solid density, ρs (kg/m ) 3.0 × 103
Two-dimensional Young's modulus, Y2D (N/m) 5.0 × 106
Damping coefficient, D 0 or 0.2
Tangential stiffness, Kt (N/m) 1.0 × 105
Fig. 12. The results of the particle sedimentation simulation: (a) Time histories of the
Coefficient of friction, μ 0
particle displacement in Y-axial direction; (b) Comparison of hydrodynamic force
Simulation time, ttotal (s) 60
applied to the particle.
 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192 185

Fig. 10 (b) illustrated the calculated trailing recirculation length Lr as

a function of the Reynolds number. Besides the results by Owen et al.
and Breuer et al., the empirical expression for Lr.

Lr
¼ −0:065 þ 0:0554 Re ð0:5b Reb60Þ ð31Þ
D

proposed by Breuer, Bernsdorf, Zeiser and Durst [19] is also plotted. Side
length D = 0.1025 m.
The pair of symmetric vortices behind the rectangle polygon emerge
when the Reynolds number lies between approximately 1.1 to 2.4,
which leads to a small recirculation length at corresponding region, as
shown in Fig. 10 (b). Owen et al. and Breuer et al. found this interval
are 3.4–4.7 and 1.1–2.0, respectively. The Lr then shows a reasonable
agreement to the empirical expression Eq. (31). But the relationship be-
tween Lr and Reynolds number was found to be nonlinear, similar to the
results of Owen et al. which also adopted the coupled LBM-IMB method.
One possible reason for this nonlinear relationship is that the IMB
scheme is sensitive the flow parameters and the hydrodynamic
boundary's real location maybe different to the physical boundary by a
certain value according to the Reynolds number. Another possible rea-
son is the influence of inlet and outlet obstacles which partly form the
periodic domain [11].
The flow pasting a rectangle obstacle simulation gives excellent
agreement to previous researches, which supports the validity of the
adopted LBM coupled with IMB scheme for polygonal obstacles.

4.2. Particle sedimentation

To validate the LBM-IMB-DEM method with the Convex Decomposi-

Fig. 14. System kinetic energy of the particle free collision simulation (with or without
damping): (a) Original group; (b) Comparative group.
Owen, Leonardi and Feng [11] and Breuer, Bernsdorf, Zeiser and
Durst [19] have conducted similar validation researches respectively,
and we consider the results from their work are credible. Owen et al.
adopted the LBM coupled with IMB method, while Breuer et al. used
both LBM with the bounce-back wall boundary scheme and finite vol-
ume methods (FVM). The parameter settings above were kept the
same with Owen et al.'s research. The results by Owen et al. and Breuer
et al. are also included in the Fig. 10 as comparison.
Drag coefficient is an important characteristic quantity of the flow
around an obstacle. The drag coefficient varies strongly with the Reyn-
olds number for the steady flow. Fig. 10 (a) shows the computed drag
coefficient in the range 0.5 b Re b 60 and it shows great correlation be-
tween the four sets of data.
tion method, particle's sedimentation simulations in the incompressible
Newtonian medium are carried to measure the y-axial displacement of
the particle and the corresponding hydrodynamic force applied, when a
single dodecagon particle falls in a tube filled with incompressible vis-
cous fluid. A comparison with the researches carried out by Wang,
Feng and Wang [20] is also conducted.
As illustrated in Fig. 11 (a), the tube has a 0.02 m diameter and a
0.06 m height. The fluid domain is formed by a 200 × 600 lattice with
the lattice spacing h = 10−4 m. The fluid kinetic viscosity ν is taken as
1.0 × 10−6 m2/s, and the density ρ is 103 kg/m3, respectively. The
solid particle's diameter is 2.5 × 10−4 m which is used as the character-
istic length, and its density ρs is 3.0 × 103 kg/m3. The fluid domain is
surrounded by four stationary walls. The initial velocities of the particle
and fluid are both zero, and the particle will move downwards due to
the gravity. The initial position of the particle is shown in Fig. 11 (a).
All above variables are kept the same as those of Wang et al.'s research.
To particularly verify the Convex Decomposition method, the dode-
cagonal particle (with a width of 2.5 × 10−4 m) is treated as the combi-
nation of four pentagons as shown in Fig. 11 (b).
Except for the IMB scheme, Wang, Feng and Wang [20] also tested
the IBM scheme which has been widely used in LBM simulation, and
we consider the results of IMB and IBM are both credible. Fig. 12
(a) and (b) show that the results from the present work match very

Table 2
Results of DEM particle free collision simulation.

Simulation group Original group Comparative group

Without damping With damping Without damping With damping

Collision times 498 424 496 417

Initial kinetic energy (×10−5 J) 2.2890 2.2890 2.2890 2.2890
Final kinetic energy (×10−5 J) 2.2881 1.2553 2.2904 1.2277
Kinetic energy changing rate (%) −0.04 −45.16 0.06 −46.37
Computation time (s) 207.12 207.83 241.06 240.97
186 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

Table 3
Results of the airborne particles filtration simulation.

Filter a b c d e

Fibre number 60 68 75 83 90
SVF (%) 20.3 22.2 24.5 25.9 26.9
Mean pore size (×10−3 m) 2.04 1.93 1.92 1.83 1.65
Average filtration rate (%) 45.3 66.7 70.7 74.7 93.3
Initial outlet flow velocity (×10−3 m/s) 8.22 7.7 6.63 5.56 4.62
Final outlet flow velocity (×10−3 m/s) 8.02 7.59 5.25 4.38 4.1

Wang et al.'s work. As a result, the motion data after the collision timing
(~0.2121 s), when the particle reaches the bottom, are not included in
Fig. 12 (a) and (b).
As can be seen from Fig. 12 (b), though using the same IMB scheme,
Wang et al. got a smoother time history of the hydrodynamic force. The
reason is that Wang et al.'s model used circular shape-based DEM in-
stead of polygonal DEM. An equilateral dodecagon particle is selected
in the present work as the substitution for the circular particle. The con-
tinuous change of boundary nodes' solid volume fraction ε of dodecagon
is less smooth than that of a circular one, which leads to a less stable hy-
drodynamic force. We treat this difference of hydrodynamic force as an
acceptable design error, and IMB scheme and the Convex Decomposi-
tion modification of our work is credible.

4.3. Free collision of DEM particles

Fig. 15. The setup of the airborne particle filtration simulation: (a) Overall setups;
(b) Three types of particle adopted the filtration simulation.
well with the literature data. In the first period (0 to ~0.5 s), the particle
moves downwards with an acceleration, and the hydrodynamic force
increases correspondingly. After a distance, both the particle velocity
and the hydrodynamic force stay constant as the gravity force and hy-
drodynamic force has reached a balanced state before the collision. It
is noted that the parameters for stationary walls are unspecified in
The stability and accuracy of the polygonal DEM module is key to the
credibility of the whole program. The instability or error of the DEM
module directly leads to changes in the kinetic energy of the system be-
fore and after the collision [16]. As a result, the section verifies the sta-
bility of DEM module by measuring the time history of kinetic energy
of the “free collision system” by calculating the total kinetic energy of
all particles. If the kinetic energy of the system is maintained after a
large number of collisions, we assume that the DEM module has satis-
factory stability and accuracy.
The verification program randomly generates 8 polygonal particles
with similar size, and the vertex number of which is the random integer
between 3 and 8. Then the particles are separately rotated by a random
angle (0 to 2π) and placed in a square zone surrounded by four static
walls (as shown in Fig. 13 (a)). The initial velocities of the particles are
chosen randomly between 2.0 × 10−3 m/s and 6.0 × 10−3 m/s with a

Fig. 16. The two-dimensional porous media emulation with different numbers of polygons.
 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192 187

Fig. 17. The average flow velocity of different filters during filtration process. Four contours show the velocity distribution of Filter a and Filter e at 0.8 s and 1.6 s.

random direction angle (0 to 2π). The range of the initial velocity is se-
lected to cover the particles' velocity in Section 5.
Ten random repeated simulations (called original groups) are con-
ducted, and Fig. 13 (a) illustrates the settings of one original group.
Each simulation has a corresponding comparative simulation (called
comparative group), where 4 of the 8 polygonal particles were treated
with the Convex Decomposition method (as shown in Fig. 13 (b)),
and all the other parameter settings are consistent with the original
group.
The free collision system simulation does not consider gravity, fric-
tion or fluid drag force, so the LBM module is not activated. The time
step of the DEM module is set as 6.0 × 10−6 s. The other parameter set-
tings are detailed in Table 1. The same parameters are used for the par-
ticles and walls.
There are numerical differences between the results of different
original groups, but the trend and conclusion are the same. Fig. 14 and
Table 2 illustrate the result of the original group shown in Fig. 13
(a) as well as its comparative group. In Fig. 14, the blue curve represents
the case without damping, while the orange curve indicates the case
where the damping force (damping coefficient D = 0.2) is added.
For both the original group and the comparative group, in the pro-
cess of about 500 collisions, system kinetic energy of cases without
damping maintains almost unchanged because of the absence of any
dissipative force, which is in accordance with the Law of Momentum
Conservation. The kinetic energy changing rate of about 0.05% is consid-
ered a negligible calculation error. Those results show that the DEM
module as well as the Convex Decomposition method have satisfactory
stability and accuracy.
As for the cases with damping, about 45% of the initial kinetic energy
is dissipated in collisions, which leads to a gradually decreasing average
velocity of the particles and consequent decreased collision times.
The introduction of the Convex Decomposition method in the com-
parative group leads to an increase in the number of individual particles
processed by the DEM module, which brings more calculations and will
consequently accumulate more calculation error. As a result, the fluctu-
ation of the system kinetic energy of the comparative group is slightly

Fig. 18. The average velocity of particles which are finally captured by the filter.
188 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

larger than the original group, which can be seen from Fig. 14. Also, the
comparative group's computation time is slightly longer than the origi-
nal group (about 16%). In general, the overall performance of the Con-
vex Decomposition method is stable and accurate, and it will not
significantly affect the computation efficiency.
5. Application test
In this section, the clean bed filtration of airborne particles is simu-
lated with the LBM-IMB-DEM coupling method. Air filtration process
is a representative complicated chemical process, the simulation of
which involves porous media, irregular particles, random collision be-
tween solid phases, and fluid-solid coupling on complex dynamic
boundaries. So the airborne particle filtration simulation can effectively
test the adaptability, computing capability and computational efficiency
of the model proposed in this paper.
As shown in Fig. 15 (a), the top and bottom sides of the computa-
tional domain (20 mm in width, 20 mm in height) are the pressure-
inlet and pressure-outlet for fluid flow individually. The length of simu-
lated particles and walls is set as small-scaled polygons. A group of par-
ticles moves downwards with the air flow, then pass through or be
intercepted by the filtration medium. 15 sets of simulation were carried:

Fig. 19. Particle trajectories and flow velocity contour of different filtration simulation setups: (a) Filter d; (b) Filter e. Red and white lines show the trajectories of particles escaped and
been captured by the filter, respectively.
 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192
Fig. 20. The SVF of the filter area after filtration.
three types of particles are chosen to represent irregular particles as
shown in Fig. 15 (b), and five types of filtering medium are generated
and applied (Filter a to Filter e illustrated in Fig. 16). Particles are treated
with the Convex Decomposition method and decomposed to four quad-
rilaterals or two pentagons.
Porous filtration media composed of cylindrical fibres (such as
electrospinning fibre) are widely used as filter material, so we use
ellipse-like polygons (with 10 to 12 corners) to emulate the filtration
structure. These polygons are randomly generated and placed as
shown in Fig. 16. Polygons can overlap with each other. By adjusting
the length-width ratio, angle, size and quantity of these polygons, char-
acteristics of the porous media can be tuned easily.
Particles and walls share the same DEM parameters for the sake of
simplification except for the solid density. Young's modulus Y2D = 5
× 107 N/m. The damping coefficient D and tangential stiffness Kt are
0.203 and 1 × 107 N/m, respectively. The friction coefficient μ is 0.3.
The time step for DEM τDEM = 6.0 × 10−6 s. The wall's density ρwall
= 3.0 × 103 kg/m3. To exaggerate the effects of air flow on the particle
and accelerate the filtration process, the density of particle ρpart is set
to a low value 100 kg/m3. As for LBM parameters: Fluid kinetic viscosity
ν = 15.06 × 10−6 m2/s. Fluid density ρ = 1.2 kg/m3. Buoyancy is
neglected due to the low density of the fluid. The relaxation time τ =
0.75. The lattice length h = 5 × 10−5 m, and the domain is divided
into a 400 × 400 lattice. The particles have an initial vertically down-
ward velocity of 2.0 × 10−3 m/s. The pressure of the inlet and outlet
are set as 1.02 and 1.00 atmosphere, respectively.
Fig. 21. The pore size distribution of Filter d with different particles after filtration.
189
The filtration effect, fluid flow pattern and particle distribution of
different filtering media are noticeable different. Table 3 lists the results
comparison of five filters. Larger fibre number leads to the bigger solid
volume fraction (SVF) and the smaller mean pore size. When increasing
the fibre number from 60 to 90, the filtration rate rises noticeably from
45.3% to 93.3%.
The filter structure affects the flow velocity significantly with the
constant pressure inlet and outlet. Fig. 17 and Fig. 18 respectively
show the average velocity of flow as well as the particles captured by
the filter in the end of simulation. In general, the filter with smaller
fibre number has bigger average flow velocity and, consequently, larger
mean particle velocity. In the early stage of clean bed filtration (0 to
~0.25 s), particles gain speed under the driven of air flow, and the
flow velocity also increases to the maximum value with the particles ac-
celerating. Due to the accumulation and clogging of the particles in the
porous media, the fluid flow rate is gradually reduced after ~0.3 s, and
therefore, the average velocity of the captured particles continued to de-
crease. It can be seen from Fig. 18 that particles with higher velocity
when entering the filter will be intercepted more quickly, which causes
average velocity to drop more rapidly after ~0.5 s. It should be noted
that, for filters with fewer fibres (Filter a and Filter b) when several par-
ticles passing through the large air passageways (as marked by the red
wireframes in Fig. 17) at the same time, air flow will be temporarily
slowed down. After the above particles pass the filter, the average
flow velocity increases to normal level. As a result, curves of Filter a
and Filter b in Fig. 17 both show depressions from about 0.6 s to 1.2 s.
As shown in Fig. 18 (b), the following types of particle shape are in-
volved: four-pointed star (Particle A), calabash shape (Particle B) and
regular hexagon (Particle C). Fig. 19 illustrates the velocity contours
and particle trajectories at the end of simulations. Though three types
of particles have the similar average filtration rate (68.8%, 70.4%
and 71.2%), they have distinct collision and stacking characteristics, so
the trajectories and distribution of the particles in the filters are signifi-
cantly different, which results in the difference in the flow velocity dis-
tribution. As shown in Fig. 19, Particle A tends to form stable horizontal
stacks with three or more particles (marked by red wireframes) and
blocks the large flow passageways. Particle B is easily to be interlaced
stacked (marked by green wireframes). By contrast, Particle C tends to
be dispersed in filters rather than densely stacked.
As shown in Figs. 20 and 21, shape characteristics of particles also
impose various effects on the filter's overall SVF and pore size after fil-
tration. As three types of particle have the similar filtration rate, Particle
C with bigger single area has larger impact on SVF than Particle A and B.
Fig. 21 takes Filter d for the example of pore size distribution, the per-
centage of large pore size (2.4 to 3.6 mm) is significantly reduced by
190 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

about 9% after filtration. Because Particle A has a more complex irregular D Damping coefficient
structure, the filter with Particle A has a higher proportion of small pore ds Distance between the mass centre of combined and constitu-
size (0 to 1.2 mm) and lower proportion of mid-range size (1.2 to ent particles
1.8 mm). Particle C has a significantly higher frequency of distribution ei Discrete velocities
in mid-range size. Fc Acting force on particle
Overall, in addition to the overall properties of various porous filters, Fdam Damping force
the LBM-IMB-DEM model allows for more microscopic simulations tak- Fhyd Hydrodynamic force
ing irregular particle's shape characteristics in to consideration. The Fela Elastic force
model is capable of simulating the interaction between complex particle fi Probability distribution function
shapes and porous media structures, providing a more detailed research feq
i Equilibrium distribution function
method for the clean bed filtration process. All 15 sets of simulation h Square lattices length
show excellent computational stability. The calculation efficiency is Icomb Combined particle's moment of inertia
also satisfying, and the calculation per one million steps takes about Is Constituent particle's moment of inertia
70 min. Kt Tangential stiffness
l Length factor
6. Conclusion m∗ Reduced mass
ms Mass of constituent particle
To simulate the complex fluid-solid two-phase system involving ar- n Weighted average of direction vectors
bitrary solid phase, an improved LBM-IMB-DEM method for the two- P Macroscopic fluid pressure
dimensional fluid-solid interaction is developed in this paper. r Direction vector
The Convex Decomposition method is proposed to handle arbitrary Tc Acting torque on particle
polygonal solid phases collision. This study uses the LBM and BGK Thyd Hydrodynamic torque
scheme for the concern of computational efficiency and ease of Up Particle translational velocity
programming. IMB scheme is adopted and optimized for the character- Us Velocity of solid lattice node
istics of polygonal solid phase boundary. The simulation program in ν Macroscopic fluid kinetic viscosity
MATLAB® environment is completed with the efficiency optimized. Y2D Two-dimensional Young's modulus
The improved progressive scanning algorithm and solid volume fraction Δt LBM time step
fast algorithm can greatly reduce the computation of the lattice node δt Accumulated tangential sliding distance
classification and solid volume fraction calculation. δ_t Tangential sliding velocity
The LBM-IMB-DEM model is verified in detail. The flow pasting a ε Solid volume fraction
rectangle polygon simulation calculates the drag coefficient and the re- μ Friction coefficient.
circulation length corresponding to Reynolds number, which verifies ρ Macroscopic fluid density
the LBM and IMB modules. The particle sedimentation simulation vali- τ Dimensionless relaxation time
dates the model by measuring displacement and corresponding hydro- τDEM DEM time step
dynamic forces applied on the particle. The accuracy of the DEM module v Macroscopic fluid velocity
and the Convex Decomposition method are validated by measuring col- Ω Collision operator
lision system kinetic energy. The above simulation results match well ω Particle angular velocity
with existing literature data or theoretical data. ωi Weighting coefficient
Finally, the simulation of the airborne particle clean bed filtration is
performed to examine the adaptability, capability and efficiency of the
LBM-IMB-DEM method. The simulation illustrates that the model can Acknowledgements
efficiently simulate the interaction between complex particle shapes
and porous media structures, providing a more detailed research The authors are grateful for financial support from the National Key
method for the filtration process. Research and Development Program of China (2018YFB0604903), the
The above work proves that the LBM-IMB-DEM is a promising National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 21776202 and
and efficient method for two-dimensional liquid-solid simulation in 21336007), and the Program for China Scholarship Council (No.
engineering applications. Expanding the current model to three- 201506250017).
dimensional cases would be straightforward in the future studies, how-
ever, how to deliver an efficient 3D DEM for irregular polyhedrons and Appendix A. Program flowchart design
reduce the computational cost is a challenge.
In traditional LBM-IMB-DEM methods, the program flowchart in-
Nomenclature cludes one LBM module for fluid mechanics simulation (see Supple-
A Overlap area mentary Fig. A.1 (a)), one DEM module for particle movement
B Weighting function calculation (mostly circular shape-based particles) and the IMB scheme
C Lattice speed, coupling the above LBM and DEM modules. Supplementary Fig. A.1 (b)
Ccomb Combined particle's centre of mass illustrates the computational flowchart adopted in the present study,
Cs Centroids constituent particles based on which we built the program on the MATLAB® platform.
 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192 191

Fig. A1. The LBM-IMB-DEM flowcharts comparison: (a) The traditional computational sequence; (b) The flowchart implementation with modified DEM module.

For the LBM module, the program follows the classical LBM calcula-
tion process. This work introduces optimized algorithms for the compu-
tation and does not revise the process arrangement. For the DEM
module, extensive modifications are introduced in the flowchart, with
three DEM sub-modules designed for the DEM calculation:
1) The first sub-module is designed for the inter-particle contact judg-
ment as well as the corresponding force, torque calculation. It is
used for all convex shaped particles, including the independent con-
vex particles and the constituent particles composing the combined
particle.
2) Similar to the first sub-module, the second sub-module is used for
particle-wall contact judgment and the corresponding force, torque
calculation. It is designed for the walls which contain stationary and
moving walls.
192 X. Li et al. / Powder Technology 356 (2019) 177–192

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