Transition by intermittency in granular matter: from discontinuous avalanches to continuous flow.

Raphaël Fischer1, Philippe Gondret, Marc Rabaud

  • 1Lab FAST, CNRS, Université Paris-Sud, Université Pierre et Marie Curie-Paris 6, Campus universitaire, F-91405 Orsay cedex, France.

Physical Review Letters
|October 2, 2009
PubMed
Summary

We studied the transition between discontinuous avalanches and continuous flow in a rotating drum. Our findings reveal intermittent flow with spontaneous switches, differing from previous reports of bistability.

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