Effective conductivity in random porous media with convex and non-convex porosity

This study shows that, given the porosity, structures with convex porosity are more conducting than structures with non-convex pores, because the bottlenecks for conduction are narrower in the second case. These situations identify two limit cases for the effective conductivity in a random isotropic porous medium, as confirmed by experimental data of structures with partly convex and partly non-convex porosity. In addition, for convex porosity the effective conductivity is larger when pores are isolated, attaining the Hashin-Shtrikman upper bound, while when pores are overlapped the effective conductivity is well described by the Archie power law.