No label defined (Q4023733)

The present doctoral thesis contains an excellent evaluation of several mathematical concepts for flow through fissured media in connection with a description of the physical building of this special type of flow. In detail a fissured medium is described to be a porous medium with nonhomogeneous structure, typically with two levels of porosity, namely porous blocks which form a so-called matrix, and a system of developed fissure channels which form paths between these blocks. Such media are of practical interest, for instance, in the domain of oil exploitation. The flow concepts are essentially based on the exact microstructure model \textit{EMS}, the averaged microstructure model \textit{AMS} and some related models as, for instance, the homogenized microstructure model \textit{HMS}. In this model from the mathematical point of view a flux term is of importance, which is represented as a convolution. Much interest is drawn on the description of this convolution term. Both models of main interest, the \textit{HMS} model and the \textit{AMS} model, are systems of coupled diffusion equations, containing a Volterra integral term -- the said convolution term -- or its discrete counterpart, respectively. After the discussion of some fundamental topics of the flow through porous media and its mathematical description as for instance Darcy's law, a detailed mathematical analysis is given of the models mentioned above. In addition, the numerical approaches to solve the resulting equation systems are discussed thoroughly. On the one side a fully discrete scheme, based on the finite element method and the Galerkin procedure combined with the discrete-in-time scheme which is used to approximate the convolution term is employed for the \textit{HMS} model, and on the other side a finite element method in combination with a certain iterative procedure is introduced in connection with the \textit{AMS} model. Questions of approximation error and of convergence of the numerical procedures are discussed in detail. Finally, results from examples are given and discussed in dependence of the governing parameters for the two models mentioned above in comparison with one another.