{
  "abstract": "Hydraulic transport in compacted bentonite is diffusion-controlled and governed by the hydration and microstructure of sodium montmorillonite (Na-MMT). Experiments cannot resolve how platelet interactions govern pore structure, transport and stiffness, while existing coarse-grained models smooth hydration oscillations or require manual corrections. We develop a tabulated potential combining Morse interactions between platelet centre and edge sites with a Gaussian process regression correction trained on all-atom potentials of mean force. It captures the hydration-induced complexity of the potential-of-mean-force profiles, including the three-water (3-W) hydration minimum and transfers across geometries, layer-charge variants and unseen configurations. Applied to monodisperse and polydisperse Na-MMT assemblies at dry densities of 0.8-1.3 g cm^-3, the model captures the 3-W to 1-W transition, loss of non-interlayer porosity and evolution of pore structure, random-walk tortuosity, diffusion and stiffness. Predicted diffusion agrees with compacted Na-bentonite measurements.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [],
  "article_type": null,
  "arxiv": "2609.20645",
  "author_total": 5,
  "authors": [
    {
      "name": "Yalda Pedram"
    },
    {
      "name": "Yaoting Zhang"
    },
    {
      "name": "Laurent Brochard"
    },
    {
      "name": "Chang Seok Kim"
    },
    {
      "name": "Laurent Karim Béland"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/46v9zwjvfyphr.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.48550/arxiv.2609.20645",
  "fulltext_url": null,
  "id": "46v9zwjvfyphr",
  "issns": [],
  "landing_url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.20645",
  "language": null,
  "licence": "LicenseRef-arXiv-nonexclusive-1.0",
  "licence_label": "arXiv licence",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/",
  "metadata_licence": "CC0-1.0",
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "arxiv",
      "cond-mat.mtrl-sci"
    ],
    [
      "openalex",
      "2205|Soil and Unsaturated Flow"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7213587568",
  "pdf_url": "https://arxiv.org/pdf/2609.20645",
  "pmcid": null,
  "pmid": null,
  "published": "2026-09-17",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/46v9zwjvfyphr.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:22:19Z",
      "native_id": "2609.20645",
      "source": "arxiv",
      "url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.20645"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "physics",
      "origin": "arxiv:cond-mat.mtrl-sci",
      "subfield": "condensed-matter"
    }
  ],
  "title": "A Gaussian process coarse-grained potential for Na-montmorillonite",
  "title_text": "A Gaussian process coarse-grained potential for Na-montmorillonite",
  "type": "preprint",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:22:19Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/46v9zwjvfyphr",
  "venue": "arXiv",
  "versions": []
}