Abstract

Fluid transport in nanoporous materials has been an active area of research for a variety of applications such as nuclear, pharmaceutical, and biomedical processes. Mechanics of fluid flow in nanopores has the added complexities due to the amplified fluid–pore wall interactions. As the size of the flow paths become smaller, these molecular level interactions may lead to deviation from classical flow into different modes of solid-surface-driven diffusion. Various flow studies using simple (Lennard-Jones) fluids such as methane have shown the presence of adsorptive–diffusive transport. In this chapter, we intend to cover these studies. In addition, nonporous naturally occurring materials such as geological porous media will be covered. Rocks could have interesting multiscale pore structures, where a nanopore network storing hydrocarbon fluids could be hydraulically in communication with a large-scale feature such as micro-fracture. The fluid transport in such multiscale pore networks finds application in natural gas production and subsurface carbon dioxide storage.