Visualization of particle interactions in granular media

Interaction between particles in so-called granular media such as soil and sand plays an important role in the context of geomechanical phenomena and numerous industrial applications. A two-scale homogenization approach based on a micro and a macroscale level is briefly introduced in this paper. The behavior of the granular matter at the microscale level is captured by a discrete element method, allowing the simulation of breaking and forming of contacts between the single grains. The problem at the macroscale level is discretized by the finite element method. A computation of granular material in such a way gives a deeper insight into the context of discontinuous materials and at the same time reduces the computational costs. However, the description and the understanding of the phenomena in granular materials are not yet satisfactory. A sophisticated problem-specific visualization technique would significantly help to illustrate failure phenomena at the microscopic level. As main contribution, we present a novel 2D approach for the visualization of simulation data, based on the above outlined homogenization technique. Our visualization tool supports visualization at the microscale level, as well as at the macroscale level. The tool shows both aspects closely arranged in the form of multiple coordinated views to give users the possibility to analyze the particle behavior effectively. A novel type of interactive rose diagram was developed to represent the dynamic contact networks at the microscale level in a condensed and efficient way