Granular Leidenfrost effect: Experiment and theory of floating particle clusters

Granular material is vertically vibrated in a 2D container: above a critical shaking strength, and for a sufficient number of beads, a crystalline cluster is elevated and supported by a dilute gaseous layer of fast beads underneath. We call this phenomenon the granular Leidenfrost effect. The experimental observations are explained by a hydrodynamic model featuring three dimensionless control parameters: the energy input S, the number of particle layers F, and the inelasticity of the particle collisions epsilon. The (S,F) phase diagram, in which the Leidenfrost state lies between the purely solid and gas phases, shows accurate agreement between experiment and theory.