%0 Journal Article
%T Finding bridges in packings of colloidal spheres
%A Matthew C. Jenkins
%A Mark D. Haw
%A Gary C. Barker
%A Wilson C. K. Poon
%A Stefan U. Egelhaaf
%J Physics
%D 2010
%I arXiv
%X We identify putative load-bearing structures (bridges) in experimental colloidal systems studied by confocal microscopy. Bridges are co-operative structures that have been used to explain stability and inhomogeneous force transmission in simulated granular packings with a range of densities. We show that bridges similar to those found in granular simulations are present in real experimental colloidal packings. We describe critically the bridge-finding procedure for real experimental data and propose a new criterion-Lowest Mean Squared Separation (LSQS)-for selecting optimum stabilisations.
%U http://arxiv.org/abs/1006.3405v1