Clusters in dense-inertial granular flows

Abstract

AbstractIn the dense-inertial regime of granular flow, the stresses scale inertially, but the flow is dominated by clusters of particles. This paper describes observations of cluster development in this regime. Clusters were seen to form for both elastic and inelastic reasons: elastic when the shear rate pushes the particles together faster than the contacts can elastically disperse them, and inelastic as large energy dissipation leads to cluster formation. Furthermore, large particle surface friction leads to cluster formation both for structural reasons, because it generates stronger clusters, and for energetic reasons, as friction dissipates energy. However, the most intriguing result of this work is that clusters appear to have little effect on the rheology of the dense inertial regime, which suggests that one can model the dense inertial regime with entirely collisional hard sphere models, and not have to worry about the complexities of modelling clusters. But at the same time it presents a physical puzzle, as one would normally expect the rheology to be strongly dependent on microstructural features such as clusters, particularly as they present an elastic pathway for internal momentum transport. There is no completely satisfying explanation for why the clusters can be ignored, but two possibilities suggest themselves. Because the clusters are short-lived, it is possible that they do not survive long enough to make a significant contribution to the momentum transport. And it is also possible for the granular temperature that governs transport between clusters to act as a rate-limiting bottleneck that is in overall control of the momentum transport rate.