Expérimental et théorique
In this project, you will focus on self-assembly of granular binary mixtures. Hard spheres of two different sizes undergoing thermal motion have revealed to form a wide range of different phases including periodic and aperiodic crystals. With the experimental setup available at LPS , we are able to realize a macroscopic version of this type of systems using grains vibrated on a substrate. This allows us to study how athermal motion influences crystallization phenomena. Depending on your interest, your project can be focused more on the simulations, or more on the experiments. Questions of interest in this study will include: How driving and dissipation mechanisms affect the stability of granular crystals? Can we observe new phases which genuinely emerge from non-equilibrium effects? Are there features of granular self-assembly which manifest at the macroscopic scale the underlying irreversible dynamics?