PowderReg

Financial Support

Costs of projects 5.852.599,70 € ; Total ERDF amount 3.501.549,99 €.

Brief Description of the Project

The task carried out for the people involved in powderregio at the Saarland University is related with granular matter flow research. This year was focused in going on developing and testing measurement techniques for rheology of granular matter. We use a standard rheometer in a cup and plate configuration to research granular matter samples with large amplitude oscillatory shear (LAOS). Our first results were presented at the Rheology 360 conference in Luxembourg (19.03.2018). Also we began to implement the first tube rheometer set-up.

By the conference CHOPS, we present and reported our results in a more complete version in two articles:

• Tuning viscoelastic moduli of granular materials in large amplitude oscillation shear rheometry (LAOS) and
• Dissipation in sheared wet and dry sand under confinement measured by a tube rheometer.

We worked with Prof. Caceres (Balseiro Institute Argentina) for developing a theory on granular gases related to the van der Walls approach, discussion about necesary set up to research the agreement with experiments. Discussion also with Dr. Pedro Pury (FAMAF, Argentina). Discussion about granular matter rheology for studying the thermodynamics of the tube Rheometer. Discussion about additional experiments with the tube rheometer in order to measure the dissipated energy and estimate the configurational entropy. The work done can be grouped in three topics related with the powder flow action of 'powderreg':

• theory and experiments in granular matter rheology
• complex stochastic dynamics of fluidized powder
• the van der Waals isothermal atmosphere model for fluidized powder.

These medium term objectives require to go on with the same actions during 2019 and eventually also during 2020; as we did in 2018.

We carry out meetings with our PowderRegio partners for coordination of different actions, mostly related to granular matter rheology. The discussions during the meetings were covering financial aspects and scientific aspects related with the actions of the project being carried out for each partner. We incorporate the enterprise CERATIZIT group, Luxembourg (www.ceratizit.com) in our committee for inovation and impact . We hold also discussions in tasks related to innovation in powder processing technologies. We contacted the group of Prof. Stefan Seelecke at Saarland University, the center for mechatronic and automation technology ZeMa www.zema.de/de/zema/. The meeting were focused on discussions related to their development of a new conveyor actuator that uses artificial muscles made from silicone polymer. We agree for a joint research project on intelligent conveyor technologies