Prof. Abbas Firoozabadi -
Senior Scientist/Director

Research Interests

A wide range of problems in petroleum engineering sciences, including:

nano-particles in flow assurance in hydrocarbon energy production

CO2 sequestration in the subsurface

thermodynamics of surfaces and thin films

physics and higher-order modeling of multiphase flow in complex permeable media

multicomponent diffusions from irreversible thermodynamics

Selected Publications

Jiménez-Ángeles, F., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Enhanced Hydrate Nucleation near the Limit of Stability," Journal of Physical Chemistry C (2015) 119, 8798-8804. 

Myint, P. C., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Thin Liquid Films in Improved Oil Recovery from Low-salinity Brine," Current Opinion in Colloid and Interface Science (2015) 20, 105-114. 

Subramanian, D., Wu, K., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Ionic Liquids as Viscosity Modifiers for Heavy and Extra-heavy Crude Oils," Fuel (2015) 143, 519-526. 

Sun, M., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Gas Hydrate Powder Formation – Ultimate Solution in Natural Gas Flow Assurance," Fuel (2015) 146, 1-5. 

Jin, Z., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Thermodynamic Modeling of Phase Behavior in Shale Media," SPE Journal (2015, in press). 

Khoshnood, A., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Polar solvents trigger formation of reverse micelles," Langmuir (2015, in press). 

Myint, P. C., Hao, Y., and Firoozabadi, A.: "The CPA Equation of State and an Activity Coefficient Model for Accurate Molar Enthalpy Calculations of Mixtures with Carbon Dioxide and Water/Brine," Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Technical Report (2015, in press).

Shahraeeni, E., Moortgat, J., and Firoozabadi, A.: "High Resolution Finite Element Methods for 3D Simulation of Compositionally Triggered Instabilities in Porous Media," Computational Geosciences (2015, in press). 

Sun, M., Firoozabadi, A., Chen, G.-J., and Sun, C.-Y.: "Hydrate Size Measurements in Anti-agglomeration at High Watercut by New Chemical Formulation," Energy and Fuels (2015, in press). 

Aslan, S., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Effect of Water on Aggregate Size, Viscosity, and Deposition of Asphaltenes in Flow-lines," Langmuir (2014) 30, 3658-3664. 

Bolton, E. W., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Numerical Modeling of Temperature and Species Distributions in Hydrocarbon Reservoirs," Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth (2014) 119, 18-31. 

Jiménez-Ángeles, F., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Nucleation of Methane Hydrates at Moderate Subcooling by Molecular Dynamics Simulations," Journal of Physical Chemistry C (2014) 118, 11310-11318. 

Zidane, A., and Firoozabadi, A.: "An Efficient Numerical Model for Multicomponent Compressible Flow in Fractured Porous Media," Advances in Water Resources (2014) 74, 127-147.

Jin, Z., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Effect of Water on Methane and Carbon Dioxide Sorption in Clay Minerals by Monte Carlo Simulations," Fluid Phase Equilibria (2014) 382, 10-20.

Li, Z., Jin, Z., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Phase Behavior and Adsorption of Pure Substances and Mixtures and Characterization in Nanopore Structures by Density Functional Theory," SPE J (December 2014), 1096-1109.

Jiménez-Ángeles, F., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Induced Charge Density and Thin Liquid Film at Hydrate/Methane Gas Interfaces," Journal of Physical Chemistry C (2014), 118, 26041-26048.

Rezaei, N. and Firoozabadi, A.: "Pressure Evolution and Production Performance of Waterflooding in n-Heptane Saturated Fired Berea Cores," SPE J (August 2014), 674-686.

Lukanov, B., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Specific Ion Effects on the Self-Assembly of Ionic Surfactants: A Molecular Thermodynamic Theory of Micellization with Dispersion Forces," Langmuir (2014), 30, 6373-6383.

Rezaei, N., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Macro- and Microscale Waterflooding Performances of Crudes which form w/o Emulsions upon Mixing with Brines," Energy and Fuels (2014) 28, 2092-2103. 

Sun, M., and Firoozabadi, A.: "Natural Gas Hydrate Particles in Oil-Free Systems with Kinetic Inhibition and Slurry Viscosity Reduction," Energy and Fuels (2014) 28, 1890-1895. 

Awards

2014 SPE Cedric K. Ferguson Award

2011 Member, National Academy of Engineering

2009 SPE Honorary Member

2004 John Franklin Carll

2002 Lucas Gold Medal

2000 Reservoir Engineering Award
2000 (now known as Reservoir Description and Dynamics Award)

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af@rerinst.org

P (650) 326-9259

F (650) 472-9285