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A stochastic model for sand sorting in a wind-tunnel

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2016

O. Barndorff-Nielsen*
Affiliation:
Aarhus University
J. N. Darroch*
Affiliation:
Flinders University
*
Postal address: Afdeling for Teoretisk Statistik, Matematisk Institut, Aarhus Universitet, DK-8000 Aarhus, Denmark.
∗∗Postal address: School of Mathematical Sciences, Flinders University of South Australia, Bedford Park, South Australia 5042, Australia.

Abstract

The wind exerts a sorting effect on particles of sands and, under certain stable conditions that occur frequently but whose nature is little understood, the sorting results in log-size distributions of the hyperbolic form, first noted by R. A. Bagnold. Here, for wind-tunnel experiments a stochastic model is constructed which exhibits a sorting effect deriving from the dependence of distance travelled on the size of the single particle. Under rather specific, experimentally testable assumptions the model reproduces log-size distributions which are of the hyperbolic type and show a variation with distance along the wind tunnel that accords with experimental findings of R. A. Bagnold.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Applied Probability Trust 1981 

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