Experimental verification of capillary force and water retention between uneven-sized spheres / Ning Lu in Journal of engineering mechanics, Vol. 134 N°5 (Mai 2008)  

Experimental verification of capillary force and water retention between uneven-sized spheres [texte imprimé] / Ning Lu, Auteur ; Jeremy Lechman, Auteur ; Kelly T. Miller, Auteur . - 2008 . - pp.385–395.
Mécanique appliquée
Langues : Anglais (eng)
in Journal of engineering mechanics > Vol. 134 N°5 (Mai 2008) . - pp.385–395.

Mots-clés :	Absorption Interfacial tension Unsaturated soils Granular materials Tensile stress Experimentation Verification
Résumé :	The recently established theoretical results of the solid-water characteristic curve (SWCC) and capillary force characteristic curve (CFCC) are experimentally verified for mechanical and hydrologic interaction between uneven-sized spherical particles under partially saturated conditions. It is shown that the theoretical framework, based on the minimization of the free energy of the liquid meniscus between the two uneven-sized particles, can predict both water retention and capillary force accurately for spherical particles ranging in radius from 165to252μm . The experimental technique is novel and the results at such scale are valuable for the understanding of gas-solid-liquid interaction among granular media, since there is very limited experimental data available in the literature. The comparisons between the theoretical and experimental predictions of the SWCC and CFCC indicate that the agreements are generally very good, confirming the validity of the theory.
ISSN :	0733-9399
En ligne :	http://ascelibrary.org/doi/abs/10.1061/%28ASCE%290733-9399%282008%29134%3A5%2838 [...]