Thermodynamically Consistent Models for Coupled Bulk and Surface Dynamics

Abstract

We present a constructive paradigm to derive thermodynamically consistent models coupling the bulk and surface dynamics hierarchically following the generalized Onsager principle. In the model, the bulk and surface thermodynamical variables are allowed to be different and the free energy of the model comprises the bulk, surface, and coupling energy, which can be weakly or strongly non-local. We illustrate the paradigm using a phase field model for binary materials and show that the model includes the existing thermodynamically consistent ones for the binary material system in the literature as special cases. In addition, we present a set of such phase field models for a few selected mobility operators and free energies to show how boundary dynamics impart changes to bulk dynamics and vice verse. As an example, we show numerically how reactive transport on the boundary impacts the dynamics in the bulk using a reactive transport model for binary reactive fluids by adopting a structure-preserving algorithm to solve the model equations in a rectangular domain.