Molecular dynamics of comminution in ball mills

We investigate autogenous fragmentation of dry granular material in rotating cylinders using two-dimensional molecular dynamics. By evaluation of spatial force distributions achieved numerically for various rotation velocities we argue that comminution occurs mainly due to the existence of force chains. A statistical analysis of these force chains explains the spatial distribution of comminution efficiency in ball mills as measured experimentally by Rothkegel [1] and Rolf [2]. For animated sequences of our simulations see http://summa.physik.hu-berlin.de/kies/mill/bm.html Received 19 January 2000