Abstract
Wherever powders are manipulated by mechanical means, adhesive and frictional forces act between the solid grains. For two centuries, these forces have been described by Coulomb's law1, a law which originally proved useful in designing civil engineering structures, and which has since been profitably extended to the understanding of the powder flows in chemical plants2. However, we have now found that Coulomb's law is not adequate to explain the compaction of fine powders in the manufacture of ceramic articles, where it has been observed that friction appears to increase for smaller particles. This apparent increase in friction is explained by considering in detail the contact of loaded, adhesive, elastic spheres.
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Kendall, K. Inadequacy of Coulomb's friction law for particle assemblies. Nature 319, 203–205 (1986). https://doi.org/10.1038/319203a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/319203a0
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