Quantification of non-Newtonian fluid dynamics of a wormlike micelle solution in porous media with magnetic resonance

•Non-Newtonian wormlike micelle solution properties impact transport in porous media.•Micelle solution displacement probability distributions show long displacement tails.•Non-Gaussian statistics occur in micelle solution probability distributions.

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) pulsed gradient stimulated echo (PGStE) techniques were used to observe anomalous transport phenomena for flow of a non-Newtonian wormlike micelle solution through a model porous media. Understanding the flow behavior of wormlike micelle solutions in porous media is important due to the growing interest of these solutions in enhanced oil recovery. NMR velocity imaging was unable to discern differences in the flow field between shear-thickening wormlike micelle solution and water due to spatial resolution limitations. However, the probability of displacement, i.e. the propagator, was skewed towards slower velocities and long tails at high displacements for the micelle solution and incorporation of a fractional dynamics approach using the moments of the probability distribution showed a deviation from asymptotic Gaussian statistics.