Numerical modelling of sediment transport and erosion processes

About the Project

Coastal erosion is one of the key impacts of changing sea-levels as a result of climate change and presents a significant threat to large populations around the world. Erosion is also a key factor to understand river dynamics, landscape change, etc. Within civil/structural engineering, soil erosion plays a significant role in the stability of large dams and embankments (e.g. piping, suffusion, internal erosion), the design of foundations for offshore structures. Computational methodologies that couple continuum and discrete approaches have been developed (e.g. CFD-DEM, SPH-DEM, LBM-DEM) to simulate both the fluid and solid phases relevant to erosion phenomena. However, existing methods are still computationally expensive, not always scalable and despite considering the particulate nature of soils, they often ignore the effects of characteristics such as a (complete) particle size distribution, particle shape, mineralogy as well as physical phenomena such as particle breakage and mineral dissolution. The objective of this PhD project is to develop advanced methodologies for modelling the realistic behaviour of soils to gain a further understanding of erosion phenomena.

Major project activities include:

• Development of computational methodologies for solid-fluid coupling accounting for varying particle shape and particle size distributions.
• Experimental validation and numerical verification of the developed frameworks.
• Application of the framework to a given problem (e.g. internal erosion in dams, surface erosion around pile foundations)
• Disseminate research outputs in journals and at conferences.

Academic qualifications

A first degree (at least a 2.2) ideally in Mechanical/Civil/Aerospace/Ocean Engineering or Mathematics or Physics.

English language requirement

IELTS score must be at least 6.5 (with not less than 6.0 in each of the four components). Other, equivalent qualifications will be accepted.

Essential attributes:

• Good fundamental knowledge of mechanics of materials mechanics, continuum mechanics, engineering maths, numerical methods (DEM/FEM/CFD) and programming skills in MATLAB or Python or C or C++.
• A strong fundamental Knowledge of solid mechanics, strength of materials, and continuum mechanics.
• Competent in MATLAB or Python or C or C++ or Fortran or Julia.
• Knowledge of numerical methods (FEM/DEM/CFD), computer modelling and simulations.
• Good written and oral communication skills.
• Strong motivation for research, with evidence of independent research skills relevant to the project.
• Good time management.

Desirable attributes:

• Experience in using open-source software.
• Experience with high-performance computing
• Knowledge of particle methods.
• Self-motivated.
• Ability to learn and adopt quickly.