Hydraulic fracturing has been extensively studied but questions remain regarding the
hydraulic fracture patterns in hydrocarbon reservoirs that often contain pre-existing weak …

Hydraulic fractures can either grow in planar structures or branch into multiple strands.
However, the conditions that cause these fracture patterns to occur are unknown and the …

Numerous numerical models have been developed to simulate the hydraulic fracturing
process in the subsurface, but few of them can predict hydraulic fracture branching, a key …

Hydraulic fracture branching has been observed in the laboratory and in the field. Our
previous studies demonstrate that hydraulic fractures can branch into multiple directions for …