COMPRESS · COMPRESS: COMPressible multiphase flow in poRous media, intErface dynamics and Stability across Scales

For over a century, research on flow in porous media has focused almost exclusively on incompressible fluids. Yet many processes of urgent societal importance, from underground hydrogen storage and CO2 sequestration to air-driven groundwater remediation and fuel cells, involve compressible gases, where gas expansion and contraction reshape how fluids invade, mix, and become unstable. Despite its importance, the physics of compressible multiphase flow remains largely unknown and absent from both theoretical frameworks and predictive tools.This project will deliver the first predictive framework for compressible displacements in porous media, bridging pore-scale physics with reservoir-scale models. Laboratory micromodel experiments and complementary simulations will reveal how compressibility interacts with viscosity, capillarity, and wettability to control invasion dynamics. These insights will inform new pore-network and continuum-scale models that capture compressibility explicitly, providing tools to predict when and how interfaces propagate and destabilize through heterogeneous rocks.Combining MIT’s expertise in pore-scale experimentation with CSIC’s leadership in analytical and stochastic upscaling, the fellowship will uniquely equip a strong multidisciplinary researcher to pioneer the emerging field of compressible fluid dynamics in porous media. It will deliver both fundamental principles and predictive frameworks applicable to a wide range of industrial and environmental settings. Through excellence in training, research, and innovation, the project will open new research avenues, positioning the researcher at the forefront of this discipline, consolidating his trajectory towards independence and future ERC-level projects, while strengthening Europe’s leadership in porous media science, climate resilience, and deployment of clean energy technologies.