Transport through Core-Shell Fibrous Biomaterials and Biological Systems

Core-shell fiber systems are three-component porous media with numerous applications in various fields, primarily in biomedical and biological systems and processes. Their effective diffusivity, viscous permeability, thermal and electrical conductivity, dielectric constant, refractive index and magnetic permeability are key transport parameters affecting the performance of such media in most applications. Nonetheless, there have been no theoretical or experimental results reported yet on the transport characteristics of such media. Our experimentally validated earlier and recent numerical methods for estimating effective mass, energy, and momentum transport properties of various types of fibrous media were extended to account for flow through beds of core-shell fibrous biomaterials of various core, shell, and matrix volume fractions and phase conductivities. The resulting numerical predictions for the effective diffusivity and viscous permeability of such systems are in agreement with earlier analytical predictions and experimental data of the literature for flow through systems of similar geometry. Further modification of our algorithms is under way, to derive the effective thermal and electrical conductivity, dielectric constant, refractive index and magnetic permeability of such systems. The numerical results will be compared to experimental data on the refractive index and thermal conductivity of core-shell fibrous media obtained through a focused beam laser ablation process.