Experimental Hydrogeology Lab

The experimental hydrogeology group is focused on understanding fundamental physics and mechanisms of fluid, gas, and solute transport in heterogeneous porous and fractured media. The image above illustrates the complexity of the pore space that fluids navigate as they flow through these natural subsurface systems. Our approach is to using in situ imaging—such as X-ray computed tomography and positron emission tomography—combined with analytical and numerical models to describe flow processes in these complex geologic systems across time and length scales. Due to the fundamental nature of this approach, and the ubiquity of fluid transport in porous media, this work has important applications across a range of important environmental and geological processes including contaminant migration in the vadose zone, fluid flow through fractured systems, colloid transport in the subsurface, and carbon dioxide transport and immobilization in carbon storage projects.

Spatial and temporal quantification of spontaneous imbibition

Accepted for publication in Geophysical Research Letters (Postprint, Supplemental Information, Data)

Positron Emission Tomography in Water Resources and Subsurface Energy Resources Engineering Research

Published in the May 2019 volume of Advances in Water Resources (Postprint)

Multimodal imaging and stochastic percolation simulation for improved quantification of effective porosity and surface area in vesicular basalt

Published in the November 2018 volume of Advances in Water Resources (Postprint, Data and Simulation Matlab Codes)

AGU Fall Meeting 2019: San Francisco, CA

Gordon Research Conferences – Flow and Transport in Permeable Media 2020: Les Diablerets, Switzerland