Parallel Multiphysics Simulations of Charged Particles in Microfluidic Flows

TL;DR

This paper presents a parallel multiphysics simulation framework for charged particles in microfluidic flows, integrating fluid dynamics, electrostatics, and rigid body motion, validated on supercomputers.

Contribution

It introduces a novel multigrid algorithm for electrostatic calculations within a parallel multiphysics simulation framework, compatible with lattice Boltzmann methods.

Findings

Efficient parallel scaling demonstrated on supercomputers.

Validated accuracy with benchmark scenarios.

Analyzed numerical efficiency of coupled algorithms.

Abstract

The article describes parallel multiphysics simulations of charged particles in microfluidic flows with the waLBerla framework. To this end, three physical effects are coupled: rigid body dynamics, fluid flow modelled by a lattice Boltzmann algorithm, and electric potentials represented by a finite volume discretisation. For solving the finite volume discretisation for the electrostatic forces, a cell-centered multigrid algorithm is developed that conforms to the lattice Boltzmann meshes and the parallel communication structure of waLBerla. The new functionality is validated with suitable benchmark scenarios. Additionally, the parallel scaling and the numerical efficiency of the algorithms are analysed on an advanced supercomputer.