Granular materials: Towards the statistical mechanics of jammed configurations

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Abstract
The properties of granular materials can be well defined, that is be a branch of physics, but conventional statistical mechanics is inadequate to handle what amounts to the physics of disordered packings of hard-core particles, either static or driven by external forces. A new approach that employs statistical-mechanical concepts is offered for the description of such systems. An analysis of the stress field in static granular packings is given within the framework of this approach. There are more conventional systems such as polymer glasses which have a rather similar statistical physics to granular media, and some speculative ideas are offered which are a real departure from conventional glass theories.

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