ABSTRACT
Porous media theory has been utilized to improve our understanding of transport processes. There are numerous practical applications that can be modeled or approximated as a transport through porous media: catalytic reactors, electronic cooling, geothermal systems, thermal insulation, drying technology, and packed-bed heat exchangers. These applications have been discussed by Nield and Bejan [1], Vafai [2], Hadim and Vafai [3], and Vafai and Hadim [4], Vafai and Tien [5,6], and Vafai [7,8]. Vafai and Tien [6] presented a comprehensive analysis of the generalized transport through porous media and developed a set of governing equations utilizing the local volume averaging technique. The use of porous media theory for modeling biomedical phenomena has resulted in significant advances in biofilms, drug delivery, computational biology, brain aneurysms filled with endovascular coil, medical imaging, porous scaffolds for tissue engineering, and diffusion processes in the extracellular space (ECS).
