Soil aggregate stability typically have a higher water infiltration rate, allowing more water into the soil profile faster, and are not susceptible to water ponding. Soil aggregates are formed due to flocculation and cementation processes, and are enhanced by physical and biological processes. Primary soil particles (sand, silt, and clay) are subjected to these processes, and can stick together to form larger sub-microaggregates (< 250 μm), microaggregates, and macroaggregates (> 250 μm). It has been suggested that soil aggregates form hierarchically, meaning larger less dense aggregates are composed of smaller more dense aggregates (Kay, 1990; Oades, 1993). Flocculation refers to a state when
Granular material by vaulting and arching. If the granular material is driven harder such that contacts between the grains become highly infrequent, the material enters a gaseous state. Correspondingly, one can define a granular temperature equal to the root mean square of grain velocity fluctuations that is analogous to thermodynamic temperature. Unlike conventional gases, granular materials will tend to cluster and clump due to the dissipative nature of the collisions between grains. This clustering has some interesting consequences. For example, if a partially partitioned box of granular materials is vigorously shaken then grains will over time tend to collect in one of