Related papers: The Domino Effect
Paper strips, e.g. confetti, descending to the floor begin to rotate around the horizontal axis after a short time. This slows down the vertical velocity compared to free fall and adds a horizontal velocity component. The frequency of…
Any gravitating mass traversing a relatively sparse gas experiences a retarding force created by its disturbance of the surrounding medium. In a previous contribution (Lee & Stahler 2011), we determined this dynamical friction force when…
We analyze a pair of diffusion equations which are derived in the infinite system--size limit from a microscopic, individual--based, stochastic model. Deviations from the conventional Fickian picture are found which ultimately relate to the…
Impact of single particle onto a rigid substrate leads to its deformation and fragmentation. The flow associated with the particle spreading on a solid substrate after impact is extremely complicated. In this theoretical study a simplified…
In this work, the effect of fluctuations in a disordered square lattice on diffusion of a test particle is studied using kinetic Monte Carlo simulations. Diffusion is relevant to a wide variety of problems, both within physics and outside…
An elementary system leading to the notions of fractional integrals and derivatives is considered. Various physical situations whose description is associated with fractional differential equations of motion are discussed.
The most important characteristics of the fragmentation of heterogeneous solids is that the mass (size) distribution of pieces is described by a power law functional form. The exponent of the distribution displays a high degree of…
I will discuss an attempt at representing an interface dynamo in a simplified, essentially 1D framework. The operation of the dynamo is broken up into two 1D layers, one containing the $\alpha$ effect and the other containing the $\omega$…
The dynamics of three soft interacting particles on a ring is shown to correspond to the motion of one particle inside a soft triangular billiard. The dynamics inside the soft billiard depends only on the {\it masses ratio} between…
Friction is a phenomenon that manifests across all spatial and temporal scales, from the molecular to the macroscopic scale. It describes the dissipation of energy from the motion of particles or abstract reaction coordinates and arises in…
It has been known for some time that rotating bars in galaxies slow due to dynamical friction against the halo. However, recent attempts to use this process to place constraints on the dark matter density in galaxies and possibly also to…
We review the results obtained by three successful fluid dynamo experiments and discuss what has been learnt from them about the effect of turbulence on the dynamo threshold and saturation. We then discuss several questions that are still…
In this article we study domino tilings of a family of finite regions called Aztec diamonds. Every such tiling determines a partition of the Aztec diamond into five sub-regions; in the four outer sub-regions, every tile lines up with nearby…
To understand the generation of the Earth's and planetary magnetic fields, we investigate numerically the combined effect of precession and convection on the dynamo action in a spherical shell. The convection alone, the precession alone and…
A new method has been proposed to evaluate the frictional force in the stationary state. This method is applied to the 1-dimensional model of clean surfaces. The kinetic frictional force is seen to depend on velocity in general, but the…
When a ball hits a surface, does the angle of reflection always equal the angle of incidence? Not at all! Depending on the interplay of the ball's spin and speed and the force of friction, the ball's behavior after the bounce may differ…
How topological defects affect the dynamics of particles hopping between lattice sites of a distorted, two-dimensional crystal is addressed. Perturbation theory and numerical simulations show that weak, short-ranged topological disorder…
Selected aspects of the Maxwell-Boltzmann for molecular speeds are discussed, with special attention to physical effects of the low speed and high speed limits. We use simple approaches to study several topics which could be included in…
A simple model for solid friction is analyzed. It is based on tangential springs representing interlocked asperities of the surfaces in contact. Each spring is given a maximal strain according to a probability distribution. At their maximal…
We study the one-dimensional diffusion process which takes place between two reflecting boundaries and which is acted upon by a time-dependent and spatially-constant force. The assumed force possesses both the harmonically oscillating and…