Sticky Sand - Looking at Cohesive Granular Materials at Multiple Length Scales

Explore the complex behavior of cohesive granular materials like sticky sand through a multi-scale analysis in this 44-minute conference talk. Examine how Earth materials such as soil, mud, ice, and rocks exist in a transitional state between solid and fluid phases, depending on the timescales under consideration. Discover the connections between geophysics and soft matter physics as you learn about glassy dynamics, strain localization, memory encoding in microstructure, active matter, and complex yielding behaviors. Investigate the novel challenges presented by the unique mixtures, excitations, geometries, and scales associated with soft Earth problems. Understand how recent research demonstrates that frontiers in geophysics are simultaneously frontiers in soft matter physics, and how combining these fields can lead to significant advances and insights in both disciplines. Delve into the theoretical and experimental approaches needed to address open questions in this interdisciplinary field, including problems related to landslides, earthquakes, erosion, glaciers, and exotic transport phenomena of earth materials.