SCIENCE - Gap geometry grasped: New algorithm could help understand structure of liquids, how they flow through porous media

Theoretical physicist Moumita Maiti and colleagues at the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research in Bangalore, India, have now implemented an algorithm for analysing void space in sphere packing, where the spheres need not all be the same size. This method, about to be published in European Physical Journal E, could be applied to analyse the geometry of liquids present between multi-sized spheres that are akin to a model for porous material. This provides a tool for studying the flow of such fluids through porous material. More importantly, it can also be used to study the packing geometry of proteins.

http://phys.org/news/2013-02-gap-geometry-grasped-algorithm-liquids.ht