Influence of thermal convection on density segregation in a vibrated binary granular system

Trajectories of a magnetic sphere in a shaken three-dimensional granular bed under low gravity

This present investigation employs an advanced magnetic particle tracking method to trace the trajectories of an intruder within a vibration-driven granular medium under artificial low-gravity conditions. The experiments are carried out within the centrifuge of the Chinese Space Station, encompassing six distinct low-gravity environments. Trajectories under various vibration modes are captured and analysed for each gravity level. This paper offers an exhaustive account of data collection and algorithms used for data processing, ensuring the dependability and precision of the datasets obtained. Additionally, we make the raw magnetic field data, processing scripts, and visualization tools accessible to the public. This research contributes a comprehensive dataset that is instrumental in exploring the mechanisms of granular segregation under low gravity and aids in the verification of novel physical models for understanding intruder dynamics in granular systems under such conditions.

Positron Emission Particle Tracking of Granular Flows

Positron emission particle tracking (PEPT) is a noninvasive technique capable of imaging the three-dimensional dynamics of a wide variety of powders, particles, grains, and/or fluids. The PEPT technique can track the motion of particles with high temporal and spatial resolution and can be used to study various phenomena in systems spanning a broad range of scales, geometries, and physical states. We provide an introduction to the PEPT technique, an overview of its fundamental principles and operation, and a brief review of its application to a diverse range of scientific and industrial systems.

New Insight into Pseudo-Thermal Convection in Vibrofluidised Granular Systems

Utilising a combination of experimental results obtained via positron emission particle tracking (PEPT) and numerical simulations, we study the influence of a system’s geometric and elastic properties on the convective behaviours of a dilute, vibrofluidised granular assembly. Through the use of a novel, ‘modular’ system geometry, we demonstrate the existence of several previously undocumented convection-inducing mechanisms and compare their relative strengths across a broad, multi-dimensional parameter space, providing criteria through which the dominant mechanism within a given system – and hence its expected dynamics – may be predicted. We demonstrate a range of manners through which the manipulation of a system’s geometry, material properties and imposed motion may be exploited in order to induce, suppress, strengthen, weaken or even invert granular convection. The sum of our results demonstrates that boundary-layer effects due to wall (in)elasticity or directional impulses due to ‘rough’ boundaries exert only a secondary influence on the system’s behaviour. Rather, the direction and strength of convective motion is predominantly determined by the energy flux in the vicinity of the system’s lateral boundaries, demonstrating unequivocally that pseudo-thermal granular convection is decidedly a collective phenomenon.

Forced axial segregation in axially inhomogeneous rotating systems

Controlling segregation is both a practical and a theoretical challenge. Using a novel drum design comprising concave and convex geometry, we explore, through the application of both discrete particle simulations and positron emission particle tracking, a means by which radial size segregation may be used to drive axial segregation, resulting in an order of magnitude increase in the rate of separation. The inhomogeneous drum geometry explored also allows the direction of axial segregation within a binary granular bed to be controlled, with a stable, two-band segregation pattern being reliably and reproducibly imposed on the bed for a variety of differing system parameters. This strong banding is observed to persist even in systems that are highly constrained in the axial direction, where such segregation would not normally occur. These findings, and the explanations provided of their underlying mechanisms, could lead to radical new designs for a broad range of particle processing applications but also may potentially prove useful for medical and microflow applications.

Competition between geometrically induced and density-driven segregation mechanisms in vibrofluidized granular systems

The behaviors of granular systems are sensitive to a wide variety of particle properties, including size, density, elasticity, and shape. Differences in any of these properties between particles in a granular mixture may lead to segregation, or "demixing," a process of great industrial relevance. Despite the known influence of particle geometry in granular systems, a considerable fraction of research into these systems concerns only uniformly spherical particles. We address, for the case of vertically vibrated granular systems, the important question of whether the introduction of differing particle geometries entirely invalidates our existing knowledge based on purely spherical granulates, or whether current models may simply be adapted to account for the effects of particle shape. We demonstrate that while shape effects can indeed influence the dynamical and segregative behaviors of a granular system, the segregative mechanisms associated with particle geometry are decidedly secondary to those related to particle density. The relevant control parameters determining the extent of geometrically induced segregation are established. Finally, a manner in which shape effects may be accounted for in simulations utilizing purely spherical particles is proposed.

Energy non-equipartition in strongly convective granular systems

Using positron emission particle tracking, the effects of convective motion and the resulting segregative behaviour on the partition of kinetic energy between the components of a bidisperse granular system are, for the first time, systematically investigated. It is found that the distribution of energy between the two system components, which are equal in size but differ in their material properties, is strongly dependent on the degree of segregation observed in the granular bed. The results obtained demonstrate that the difference in energy obtained by dissimilar particle species is not an innate property of the materials in question, but can in fact be altered through variation of the relevant system parameters. The existence of a relationship between the convective and segregative properties of a granular system and the degree of energy equipartition within the system implies the possibility of extending existing theory into the convective regime. Thus, our findings represent an incremental step towards the definition of a granular analogy to temperature that can be applied to more generalised systems and, through this, an improved understanding of inhomogeneous granular systems in general.