Surface orientation tensor to predict preferred contact orientation and characterise the form of individual particles

The characterisation and classification of particle form are typically based on the consideration of the main particle dimensions, for the derivation of which no method has been unanimously accepted or proven to be representative of its morphology or load-bearing capabilities. This study proposes a weighted fabric tensor, named surface orientation tensor, that characterises the form of an individual particle. Using the eigenvalues of this tensor, efficient measures of compactness, flakiness and elongation are proposed. In comparison to the traditional oriented bounding box approaches, it has the advantage that it is based directly on the orientations of the normal vectors of the faces forming the surface of the particle, i.e. those directions along which the particle can best transmit contact forces to its neighbours. The advantages of the proposed approach are pointed out with discrete element simulations on assemblies of polyhedral particles. (c) 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Automated summary

A new tensor called surface orientation tensor is proposed in this study to characterize the form of individual particles, with efficient measures like compactness, flakiness, and elongation. The method directly uses normal vectors of particle surfaces to transmit contact forces efficiently to neighboring particles. The advantages of this approach are demonstrated through discrete element simulations on assemblies of polyhedral particles.