(348b) Effect of Non-Sphericity of Particles on Segregation of Bidisperse Granular Mixture in Lab-Scale Industrially Relevant Systems Using DEM and Experiments

A binary mixture of spherical particles have a tendency to segregate based on the difference in size in different flow situations. Most of the granular particles found in the industries are generally non-spherical. In the present work, we have used the discrete element method and experiments in combination to study the evolution of the segregation and its dependence on both the shape and size of the particles. Different shapes like spherical, ellipsoids (prolate and oblate), cubical, elongated needle have been used. Studies have been carried out in a rotating cylinder, fluidised bed and vibrated packed bed.We have carried out the study by fixing one of the particle of a binary mixture to be a sphere, and varying the shape of the other particle while operating in different flow regime. Our results indicate that the segregation index at steady state value depend only on the shape of the larger particle, but is independent of the shape of smaller particle. These results have important industrial design implications and provide important heuristics to decrease segregation by choosing the shape of the particles.