Poroelastic-Transport Finite Element Formulation Including Convection and Swelling

Poroelastic-transport (Simon et al [1995]) and triphasic models (Lai et al [1991]) of soft tissues have been developed recently. These descriptions include mass transport by diffusion and convection, the influence of electrical and chemical potentials, and swelling. The interactions between the porous solid skeleton, the mobile tissue fluid and the concentrations of charged species are accounted for. This abstract presents work in progress to extend the finite element model (FEM) formulation of Kaufmann et al [1995] to include convection effects. The current isotropic formulation is valid for linear elastic small strain analyses with the diffusion/convection of a single species and includes swelling effects. This formulation and corresponding program represent the foundation on which to expand to the more general cases of porohyperelastic large strain behavior and multi-electrolyte transport to better understand transport and swelling phenomena in soft tissues.