Shearing behavior of polydisperse media
arXiv:cond-mat/0407755 · doi:10.1140/epje/i2004-10144-7
Abstract
We study the shearing of polydisperse and bidisperse media with a size ratio of 10. Simulations are performed with a the two dimensional shear cell using contact dynamics. With a truncated power law for the polydisperse media we find that they show a stronger dilatancy and greater resistance to shearing than bidisperse mixtures. Motivated by the practical problem of reducing the energy needed to shear granular media, we introduce "point-like particles" representing charged particles in the distribution. Even though changing the kinematic behavior very little, they reduce the force necessary to maintain a fixed shearing velocity.
17 pages, 15 figures