Year: 2021
Type: article
Abstract: Grains are widely assumed to be characterized by a single temperature —derived either from the configurational entropy, or employing the kinetic theory. Yet granular media do have two temperatures, T g and T , pertaining to the grains and atoms. It is argued here that a two-temperature plasma yields a more useful analogy for grains than a molecular gas: 1) Irreversible collisions also occur in plasma, to reach the equilibrium of equal temperature. 2) The plasma energy is not linear in the two temperatures; it is quadratic in the temperature difference, minimal at equilibrium. Both points have valid analogues in grains, yielding useful insights.
Source: Europhysics Letters (EPL)
Author: Mario Liu
Institution: University of Tübingen
Language: English
Subfield: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3207370779