Ahmad Awdi, Camille Chateau, Abdoulaye Fall, Jean-Noël Roux, Patrick Aimedieu
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引用次数: 0
Abstract
The microstructure of sheared unsaturated wet granular materials, comprising solid particles, liquid phases, and void spaces, is explored using X-ray micro-tomography. Advanced segmentation techniques are employed to overcome challenges in distinguishing phases within the material, utilizing a combination of Random Forest and U-Net models for accurate segmentation of the X-ray images. This methodology enables the quantification of the solid and liquid fractions within the sample, revealing the effects of shear deformation on their distribution. Additionally, an automated tool is designed to characterize the local geometry of small liquid domains, classified according to the number of connected liquid bridges joining grain pairs and the shape of such clusters. It is shown that deformation redistributes the liquid phase, which tends to be excluded from the strongly sheared regions. Coordination number estimates agree with published numerical simulation results. The study also addresses some limitations related to voxel size. The robust tools to analyse complex three-phase microstructure of wet granular materials are expected to improve the modeling of their rheology under different conditions.
Graphical Abstract
"Exploring the microstructure of sheared unsaturated wet granular materials using X-ray micro-tomography. Advanced segmentation with Random Forest and U-Net models enables quantitative analysis of liquid morphologies, after automatic classification, and their evolution under shear, revealing redistribution patterns and coordination changes
期刊介绍：
Although many phenomena observed in granular materials are still not yet fully understood, important contributions have been made to further our understanding using modern tools from statistical mechanics, micro-mechanics, and computational science.
These modern tools apply to disordered systems, phase transitions, instabilities or intermittent behavior and the performance of discrete particle simulations.
>> Until now, however, many of these results were only to be found scattered throughout the literature. Physicists are often unaware of the theories and results published by engineers or other fields - and vice versa.
The journal Granular Matter thus serves as an interdisciplinary platform of communication among researchers of various disciplines who are involved in the basic research on granular media. It helps to establish a common language and gather articles under one single roof that up to now have been spread over many journals in a variety of fields. Notwithstanding, highly applied or technical work is beyond the scope of this journal.
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