A Hybrid Approach for the Modelling of Complex Systems: Methodologies and Applications

In this paper the hybrid approach is presented for the modelling of complex systems that involve many interacting components with different physical properties over different spatial and temporal scales. Such systems are difficult to resolve, since they exhibit high levels of uncertainty. We briefly discuss other modelling strategies and their advantages and disadvantages and then a complete description of the mathematical-computational hybrid framework is given. Then, an application from the field of particulate-based engineering processes is presented and the ability of the framework is demonstrated to accurately represent key granular material processes with the aid of information extracted from different scales.