Metastability of a granular surface in a spinning bucket
Soft Condensed Matter
2009-10-31 v1 Statistical Mechanics
Abstract
The surface shape of a spinning bucket of granular material is studied using a continuum model of surface flow developed by Bouchaud et al. and Mehta et al. An experimentally observed central subcritical region is reproduced by the model. The subcritical region occurs when a metastable surface becomes unstable via a nonlinear instability mechanism. The nonlinear instability mechanism destabilizes the surface in large systems while a linear instability mechanism is relevant for smaller systems. The range of angles in which the granular surface is metastable vanishes with increasing system size.
Cite
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/9803112,
title = {Metastability of a granular surface in a spinning bucket},
author = {Chuck Yeung},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/9803112},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
8 pages with postscript figures, RevTex, to appear in Phys. Rev. E