Numerical modeling of the movement of a rigid particle in viscous fluid

Modeling the movement of a rigid particle in viscous fluid is a problem physicists and mathematicians have tried to solve since the beginning of this century. A general model for an ellipsoidal particle was first published by Jeffery in the twenties. We exploit the fact that Jeffery was concerned with formulae which can be used to compute numerically the velocity field in the neighborhood of the particle during his derivation of equations of motion of the particle. This is our principal contribution to the subject. After a thorough check of Jeffery's formulae, we coded software for modeling the flow around a rigid particle based on these equations. Examples of its applications are given in conclusion. A practical example is concerned with the simulation of sigmoidal inclusion trails in porphyroblast.