Related papers: Failure processes of cemented granular materials
The damage and fracture of materials are technologically of enormous interest due to their economic and human cost. They cover a wide range of phenomena like e.g. cracking of glass, aging of concrete, the failure of fiber networks in the…
When dense granular gases are continuously excited under microgravity conditions, spatial inhomogeneities of the particle number density can emerge. A significant share of particles may collect in strongly overpopulated regions, called…
The discrete element method (DEM) can provide detailed descriptions of sea ice dynamics that explicitly model floes and discontinuities in the ice, which can be challenging to represent accurately with current models. However, floe-scale…
Highly-deformable materials, from synthetic hydrogels to biological tissues, are becoming increasingly important from both fundamental and practical perspectives. Their mechanical behaviors, in particular the dynamics of crack propagation…
We investigate the segregation of a dense binary mixture of granular particles that only differ in their restitution coefficient. The mixture is vertically vibrated in the presence of gravity. We find a partial segregation of the species,…
This paper presents an extension of the discrete element method using a phase-field formulation to incorporate grain shape and its evolution. The introduction of a phase variable enables an effective representation of grain geometry and…
The mechanical behavior of continuous fiber reinforced granular columns is simulated by means of a Discrete Element Model. Spherical particles are randomly deposited simultaneously with a wire, that is deployed following different patterns…
The structure and stresses of static granular packs in cylindrical containers are studied using large-scale discrete element molecular dynamics simulations in three dimensions. We generate packings by both pouring and sedimentation and…
Entangled materials offer attractive structural features including tensile strength and large deformations, combined with infinite assembly and disassembly capabilities. How the geometry of individual particles governs entanglement, and in…
We systematically studied the validity and transferability of effective, coarse-grained, pair potentials in ultrasoft colloidal systems. We focused on amphiphilic dendrimers, macromolecules which can aggregate into clusters of overlapping…
Plate motion near the fault gouge layer, and the elastic interplay between the gouge layer and the plate under stick-slip conditions, is key to understanding the dynamics of sheared granular fault systems. Here, a two-dimensional…
Cohesive powders tend to form porous aggregates which can be compacted by applying an external pressure. This process is modelled using the Contact Dynamics method supplemented with a cohesion law and rolling friction. Starting with…
Granular materials react to shear stresses differently than do ordinary fluids. Rather than deforming uniformly, materials such as dry sand or cohesionless powders develop shear bands: narrow zones containing large relative particle motion…
In this paper, we study the preferential stiffness and the crack-tip fields for an elastic porous solid of which material properties are dependent upon the density. Such a description is necessary to describe the failure that can be caused…
The irregularity of particle motions during quasi-static deformation is investigated using discrete element (DEM) simulations of sphere and sphere-cluster assemblies. A total of three types of interparticle movements are analyzed: relative…
The two key phenomena occurring in the process of ceramic powder compaction are the progressive gain in cohesion and the increase of elastic stiffness, both related to the development of plastic deformation. The latter effect is an example…
Simulation of fracturing processes in porous rocks can be divided into two main branches: (i) modeling the rock as a continuum which is enhanced with special features to account for fractures, or (ii) modeling the rock by a discrete (or…
Flexible barriers are increasingly used for the protection from debris flow in mountainous terrain due to their low cost and environmental impact. However, a numerical tool for rational design of such structures is still missing. In this…
Soft-granular media, such as dense emulsions, foams or tissues, exhibit either fluid- or solid-like properties depending on the applied external stresses. Whereas bulk rheology of such materials has been thoroughly investigated, the…
We present a deformable Discrete Element Method (DEM) that extends the classical rigid-particle formulation through a reduced-order description of elastic grain-scale deformation. The method hinges on two developments. First, an energetic…