Quantification of Evaporation and Drainage Processes in Unsaturated Porous Media Using Magnetic Resonance Imaging

The water loss in packed beds was studied spatially and time‐resolved via magnetic resonance imaging on the pore scale. The packed beds were measured under water‐saturated and unsaturated conditions, while the magnetic resonance method allowed a quantitative differentiation between air, liquid, and solid phases exploring the native contrast of the named phases without additional contrast agents. Beside a qualitative image comparison, subsequent quantitative image processing allowed for a detailed spatially resolved determination of water distribution, the differentiation between water transport processes, and the quantification of liquid clusters in 3‐D. Results are presented for two packed beds that show significant differences in their evaporation and drainage dynamics, which are mainly determined by the physical properties of the packed beds. The water loss of the packed bed of 2–4 mm quartz particles reached a level below interpretability after 18.2 hr; meanwhile, a successive decrease of the largest liquid cluster volume from 82.5 to 0.7 mm3 was observed. The water content of the packed bed of 2 mm glass spheres was still observable after 70.9 hr. During the experiment, no significant changes in the structure of the liquid clusters were measured. The current work displays the applicability of magnetic resonance imaging for pore‐scale investigations without the addition of contrast agents.Key Points: Pore‐scale investigations were performed by MRI without additional contrast agents Dominant water loss processes were differentiated. Liquid clusters were analyzed within the 3‐D data sets.German Research Foundation (DFG) http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/50110000165