Statistical mechanics of dense granular fluids - contacts as quasi-particles

A new first-principles statistical mechanics formulation is proposed to describe slow and dilated granular fluids, where prolonged intergranular contacts vitiate collision theory. The contacts, where all the important physics takes place, are regarded as quasi-particles that can appear and disappear. A contact potential, $ν$, is defined as a measure of the fluctuations and the mean coordination number per particle and its fluctuations are calculated as a function of it. This formulation extends the Edwards statistical mechanics to slow dynamic systems and converges to it when the motion stops. The theory is applied to a model system of a simply sheared granular material in the limit of small confining stress. The dependence of the contact potential on the shear rate is derived, making it possible to calibrate $ν$ experimentally and predict the coordination number distribution as a function of the shear rate. Setting next $ν=0$ as the jamming point, where the critical mean coordination number is $z_c$, a finite value is found for the shear rate there, $\dotγ_c$. A simple mean field theory then yields the scaling of the mean coordination number and its fluctuations near $\dotγ_c$. Existing results in the literature appear to support the predictions.

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