Crossover from Jamming to Clogging Behaviors in Heterogeneous Environments

TL;DR

This paper investigates the transition between jamming and clogging in particle systems, revealing distinct behaviors and phase transition characteristics as particle density varies in heterogeneous environments.

Contribution

It identifies and characterizes the crossover from clogging to jamming, highlighting their different dynamical and structural properties in particle assemblies.

Findings

Clogging exhibits an absorbing phase transition with phase separation.

Jamming involves rapid formation of a homogeneous rigid pack.

Distinct divergence behaviors of characteristic length scales.

Abstract

Jamming describes a transition from a flowing or liquid state to a solid or rigid state in a loose assembly of particles such as grains or bubbles. In contrast, clogging describes the ceasing of the flow of particulate matter through a bottleneck. It is not clear how to distinguish jamming from clogging, nor is it known whether they are distinct phenomena or fundamentally the same. We examine an assembly of disks moving through a random obstacle array and identify a transition from clogging to jamming behavior as the disk density increases. The clogging transition has characteristics of an absorbing phase transition, with the disks evolving into a heterogeneous phase-separated clogged state after a critical diverging transient time. In contrast, jamming is a rapid process in which the disks form a homogeneous motionless packing, with a rigidity length scale that diverges as the jamming density is approached.