Asymmetric and long range interactions in shaken granular media

Abstract

We use a computational model to investigate the emergence of interaction forces between pairs of intruders in a horizontally vibrated granular fluid. The time evolution of a pair of particles shows a maximum of the likelihood to find the pair at contact in the direction of shaking. This relative interaction is further studied by fixing the intruders in the simulation box where we identify effective mechanical forces and torques between particles and quantify an emergent long range attractive force as a function of the shaking relative angle, the amplitude, and the packing density of grains. We determine the local density and kinetic energy profiles of granular particles along the axis of the dimer to find no gradients in the density fields and additive gradients in the kinetic energies.