Porosity calculation of particle mixtures: an overview

Particle characteristics affect porosity mainly via three factors: dimensionless particle size distribution, particle shape and absolute particle size, giving various packing systems from the simple coarse spherical particle packing to the complicated system involving fine and nonspherical powders. Consequently, the modelling of the relationship between porosity and particle characteristics may be carried out by considering these three factors. In the past decade or so, significant progress has been made in this area. This paper presents a brief review of the previous work. The dependence of porosity on particle size and shape, and their distributions is examined from typical examples for different packing systems. The need for further development is also discussed.