COMPUTATIONAL LABORATORY FOR THE SIMULATION OF

THE GOAL OF THE WORK IS TO DEVELOP A COMPUTATIONAL SIMULATION TOOL TO ALLOW SCALING-UP THE DESIGNS OF LABORATORY SIZE OR SEMI-INDUSTRIAL GRANULAR FLOW SYSTEMS TO FULL-SCALE INDUSTRIAL DIMENSIONS. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS RANGE FROM THE DESIGN OF CHUTES TO HOPPERS, BINS, AND OTHER SYSTEMS FOR TRANSPORTING BULK SOLIDS. RESEARCHERS ARE CONCENTRATING ON COMPLEMENTARY THEORETICAL AND COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSES OF DILUTE GRANULAR SYSTEMS. RESEARCHERS ARE PERFOMING ANALYSES BASED ON KINETIC THEORY, AS WELL AS HIGH-RESOLUTION STATE-OF-THE-ART SIMULATIONS OF GRANULAR SYSTEMS AND STUDY OF PROTOTYPE SOLUTIONS OF COARSE-GRAINED (MACROSCOPIC) EQUATIONS. PARTICLE DYNAMICS SIMULATIONS OF UNFORCED AND SHEARED GRANULAR SYSTEMS WITH UP TO A FEW MILLION PARTICLES ARE BEING USED TO TEST THE MACROSCOPIC EQUATIONS AND TO IMPROVE THE RESULTS OBTAINED REGARDING THE SINGLE-PARTICLE AND TWO-PARTICLE DISTRIBUTION FUNCTIONS.