VGW (VIRTUAL GEOSCIENCE WORKBENCH) is a suite of Open Source tools for modelling discontinuous, particulate, granular, blocky, fracturing and fragmenting systems based on FEMDEM (the combined Finite-Discrete element method). A workshop will be held at the Department of Earth Science and Engineering, Imperial College London, March 30. This will feature a morning of presentations showing methods and applications. Examples of coupling VGW e.g. with the generic CFD code FLUIDITY, will be shown. The afternoon includes computer hands-on and Q&A sessions. VGW will be of interest to Academics and industrial colleagues concerned with particulates, geomechanics and multiphase. To register, email: [email protected]

VGW is a collaborative five-year project funded by EPSRC and is under development on two sites, Imperial College London (PI: Dr J-P. Latham) and Queen Mary University of London (PI: Prof A Munjiza). FEMDEM, pioneered by Munjiza in the 1990s, is the core of the solids technology as it is especially well suited to irregular geometry with deforming and fracturing behaviour and the transition from continuum to discontinuum.