Granular material or materials composed of grains (e.g., sand, rice, particles suspended in extracted oil) is the second most dominant form of material in the universe after fluids. How will the shape of constituent particles affect the structure, dynamics, and mechanics of granular materials?

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During Ph.D. I investigated the granular mechanics of rod-like particles. In work published in the journal Physical Review E, we demonstrate that driving rod-like particles may spontaneously crystalize them into ordered domains, and the degree of order is proportional to the aspect ratio of rods. As a part of this project, I also developed a method to track rod-like particles in 3D using x-ray CT data. In another work published in the journal European Physical Journal E, we study the diffusive motion of rod-like particles in crowded environments composed of similar particles. We demonstrated that the diffusion coefficients in parallel and perpendicular directions of a rod scale differently from what is predicted by models of rod-like polymers in polymer dynamics.

Representative publications:

“Diffusion of Granular Rods on a Rough Vibrated Substrate,” V. Yadav and A. Kudrolli, European Physical Journal E, (2012).

“Effect of Aspect Ratio on the Development of Order in Vibrated Granular Rods,” V. Yadav, J. Y. Chastaing and A. Kudrolli, Phys. Rev. E, (2013).

“Dynamics, Mechanics and Pattern Formation in Systems with Inherent Asymmetry,” V. Yadav, Ph.D. Thesis, (2015).