Parallelization of a Lagrangian–Eulerian DEM/CFD code for application to fluidized beds

The coupled Lagrangian–Eulerian DEM/CFD code developed over several years at Aston University and the University of Birmingham has been parallelized using a single program multiple data (SPMD) strategy. Initial implementation on a high-performance compute cluster indicated good scalability up to 32 processors, beyond which speedup gains are swamped by the all-processor communication overhead inherent in the fluid flow algorithm. A Geldart group A powder bed comprising 1 million particles was fluidized in the bubbling regime using the parallelized code.