Gas mixing through a smoothed particle hydrodynamics approach

ABSTRACT Transport and mixing of gas species are of particular interest in planetary environments, where interactions among multiple species can occur within confined or porous media. In this work, we present a novel smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) approach for modelling the mixing of binary gas species. The model treats each gas as a separate fluid governed by its own set of Euler equations, coupled through collisional momentum and energy exchange terms derived from a kinetic relaxation model based on the Boltzmann equation. The numerical scheme employs a first-order operator splitting approach combined with a two-step Euler integrator. In this setup, the hydrodynamic evolution is first computed using standard SPH techniques to handle pressure forces. This is followed by a separate correction step that accounts for interspecies collisional exchanges. Such a decoupled treatment enables the use of a larger time-step dictated by hydrodynamics rather than the typically much smaller collisional time-scale, enhancing computational efficiency. The model achieves good accuracy in reproducing the equilibration of density and temperature in a range of molecular mass ratios. Its modular structure supports natural extensions to polyatomic mixtures and enables the inclusion of additional physics, such as gas–solid interactions with dust and ice. These features make the method particularly well-suited for applications involving confined, multicomponent gas systems, such as those expected during the ESA ExoMars mission.