Events in Physics

Statistical properties of an assembly of vibrated granular systems

Akin to what is observed in equilibrium thermodynamics, granular systems display statistical properties because of the huge number of particles they involve. Although athermal, it is thought that some of these properties can be described reliably within an "equilibrium" statistical mechanics framework very similar to that of Gibbs ensembles and called Edwards' statistical mechanics. Focusing on simulations of vibrated granular systems, we will firstly look at an ensemble of them and probe the evolution of their statistics with time. This will allow us to question the type of approach --- ensemblist of frequentist --- that should be used and compared to Edwards' predictions. This questioning is inevitably related to some formulation of the ergodicity property of the system that we shall then test for our system. Finally, the compatibility with Edwards' framework will be discussed.