Reply to Comment on `What Determines the Static Force Chains in Stressed Granular Media?'

TL;DR

This paper clarifies the distinction between force determination from visual data and force statistics in granular media, emphasizing the use of an iterative method to improve force estimates despite measurement uncertainties.

Contribution

It differentiates the original force determination formalism from force statistics analysis and advocates for an iterative approach to enhance force measurements under experimental errors.

Findings

The original formalism is valid with accurate data.

Measurement uncertainties can be mitigated using an iterative procedure.

The paper clarifies the scope of force analysis in granular media.

Abstract

The formalism proposed in Phys. Rev. Lett. 116, 078001 (2016) for determination of the normal and tangential inter-particle forces in frictional disks from visual data was criticized in a comment to that paper. However the theory developed in the original publication is aimed at finding the forces when provided with accurate measurements while the comment addresses a different problem, being the statistics of forces in a configuration with uncertainty of the relevant parameters. We address this difference in perspectives and point out that even with experimental errors one can improve the results using an iterative procedure proposed in Phys. Rev. E. Rapid Communication, 93, 060601(R) (2016).