Modeling of gas diffusion layers with curved fibers using a genetic algorithm

This paper presents a methodology for modeling microstructures of fibrous porous media with curved fibers. The developed methodology utilizes implicit periodic surface model coupled with the genetic algorithm (GA) optimization to construct the porous microstructures. The fibers profile is represented by the periodic implicit surfaces and their orientation and curvature are determined by GA optimization. To reconstruct the microstructures with higher resemblance to the actual porous media GA is utilized to minimize the fibers stored strain energy and their intersection volumes. Coupling the image processing techniques to the geometry construction procedure the morphological and transport properties of the constructed microstructures are also determined. To verify the feasibility and the accuracy of the proposed methodology the microstructure of Freudenberg H2315 GDL is constructed and characterized. The presented methodology enables a parametric design approach. Thus, the effects of the microstructure's properties e.g., fibers diameter, fibers orientation and porosity of the porous structure on the transport properties of the fibrous media are investigated.