Related papers: The Brazil-nut effect and its application to aster…
We study bidisperse suspensions -- suspensions where there are two particle species of the same density but different sizes -- of a viscous fluid on an incline. We use a lubrication theory/thin film model to form a hyperbolic system of…
In some countries, cars and motorbikes are allowed to pass through the same road. We observe a phenomenon similar to a Brazil nut effect (BNE) that frequently occurs on such roads, in which motorbikes (representations of small particles)…
The system of driven dense colloid mixtures is studied in one-, two- and three-dimensional geometries. We calculate the diffusion coefficients and mobilities for each particle type, including cross-terms, in a hydrodynamic limit, using a…
We present a framework to study regolith segregation on rubble-pile asteroids (self-gravitating granular aggregates) due to seismic shaking induced by impacts sustained during their lifetimes. We first relate the amplitude and frequency of…
It is demonstrated that the minimization of the free energy functional for hard spheres and hard disks yields the result that excited granular materials under gravity segregate not only in the widely known "Brazil nut" fashion, i.e. with…
We present a novel implementation of a soft sphere, discrete elements code to simulate the dynamics of self-gravitating granular materials. The code is used to study the outcome of sub-sonic collisions between self-gravitating rubble piles…
The subject of this work is the physical characterization of asteroids, focusing on the thermal inertia of near-Earth asteroids (NEAs). Thermal inertia governs the Yarkovsky effect, a non-gravitational force which significantly alters the…
A large disruption in the main asteroid belt can cause a large flux, an "asteroid shower", on the terrestrial planets. We quantitatively examine the hypothesis that such an event was the cause of the lunar late heavy bombardment (LHB). We…
In this work, we study the dynamics of particles around Bennu. The goal is to understand the stability, evolution, and final outcome of the simulated particles around the asteroid. According to the results, the particle sizes can be divided…
Near Earth Objects (NEOs) are a transient population of small bodies with orbits near or in the terrestrial planet region. They represent a mid-stage in the dynamical cycle of asteroids and comets, which starts with their removal from the…
We numerically and experimentally study the segregation dynamics in a binary mixture of microswimmers which move on a two-dimensional substrate in a static periodic triangular-like light intensity field. The motility of the active particles…
The rise dynamics of a large spherical particle, in a granular bed under vertical vibrations, is experimentally studied. An inductive device has been designed to track the particle while it climbs through the bed under different conditions.…
Observational data of asteroids can be explained by considering them as an agglomerate of granular material. Understanding the mechanical properties of these objects is relevant for many scientific reasons: space missions design, evaluation…
Most asteroids with a diameter larger than $\sim 300 \ {\rm m}$ are rubble piles i.e. consisting of more than one solid object. All asteroids are rotating but almost all asteroids larger than $\sim 300 \ {\rm m}$ rotate with a period longer…
Our knowledge of the strengths of small bodies in the Solar System is limited by our poor understanding of their internal structures, and this, in turn, clouds our understanding of the formation and evolution of these bodies. Observations…
Equilibrium sedimentation density profiles of charged binary colloidal suspensions are calculated by computer simulations and density functional theory. For deionized samples, we predict a colloidal ``brazil nut'' effect: heavy colloidal…
We present extensive Molecular Dynamics simulations on species segregation in a granular mixture subject to vertical taps. We discuss how grain properties, e.g., size, density, friction, as well as, shaking properties, e.g., amplitude and…
In this paper we use a Soft-Sphere Discrete Element method code to simulate the transmission and study the attenuation of a seismic wave. Then, we apply our findings to the different space missions that have had to touch the surface of…
We present a series of numerical simulations using a shock physics smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) code, investigating energetic impacts on small celestial bodies characterised by diverse internal structures, ranging from weak and…
Black holes are interesting astrophysical objects that have been studied as systems sensitive to quantum gravitational data. The accelerated geometry in the exterior of extremal black holes can induce large center-of-mass energies between…