Flow Development of a Sheared Collisional Granular Flow

Abstract

We analyze the development of a collisional granular flow without gravitational accelerations in a shear cell shaped as a racetrack. Variations of the cross-sectional averaged solid volume fraction, mean velocity and fluctuation energy along the straight region of the cell are captured by an integral technique similar to the treatment of boundary layers. The results compare well with data from molecular dynamical simulations of the cell. The theory captures the role of side walls and streamwise temperature variations on the flow development.