A granular material (also known as granular media or granular matter) is a dense packing of non-cohesive solid particles.

See Soft matter physics and Complex systems

Force networks

Force Distributions in Dense Two-Dimensional Granular Systems Despite the highly uniform density of a random packing of non-cohesive particles, photoelastic visualizations provide a striking evidence of the heterogeneous distribution of contact forces on a scale definitely larger than the typical particle size

Bimodal Character of Stress Transmission in Granular Packings

Shear-Jamming in Two-Dimensional Granular Materials with Power-Law Grain-Size Distribution

Apollonian Networks: Simultaneously Scale-Free, Small World, Euclidean, Space Filling, and with Matching Graphs

http://www.phy.duke.edu/~bob/

The role of particle shape on the stress distribution in a sandpile

Scattering of waves by impurities in precompressed granular chains

Fragmentation process

Fragmentation of grains in a two-dimensional packing

Statistical Models for the Fracture of Disordered Media