Higher-order moment theories for dilute granular gases of smooth hard-spheres (1701.09052v2)

Abstract: Grad's method of moments is employed to develop higher-order Grad's moment equations---up to first 26-moments---for granular gases within the framework of the (inelastic) Boltzmann equation. The homogeneous cooling state of a freely cooling granular gas is investigated with the Grad's 26-moment equations in a semi-linearized setting and it is shown that the granular temperature in the homogeneous cooling state still decays according to Haff's law while the other higher-order moments decay on a faster time scale. The constitutive relations for stress and heat flux (the Navier--Stokes and Fourier relations) are obtained by performing a Chapman--Enskog-like expansion on the Grad's 26-moment equations and compared with those existing in the literature. The linear stability of the homogeneous cooling state is analyzed through the Grad's 26-moment system and various sub-systems by decomposing them into longitudinal and transverse systems. It is found that one eigenmode in both longitudinal and transverse systems in case of inelastic gases is unstable. By comparing the eigenmodes from various theories, it is established that the 13-moment eigenmode theory predicts that the unstable eigenmode remains unstable for all wavenumbers below a certain coefficient of restitution while any other higher-order moment theory shows that this mode becomes stable above some critical wavenumber for all values of coefficient of restitution. In particular, the Grad's 26-moment theory leads to a smooth profile for the critical wavenumber in contrast to the other considered theories. Furthermore, the critical system size obtained through the Grad 26-moment and existing theories are also in excellent agreement.