Collective phenomena in vertically shaken granular matter

Granular matter is the general name for materials consisting of grain-like solids and can be encountered everywhere in our daily life, for instance in the form of sand, sugar, cereals and pills. Numerous industries deal with these kinds of materials, which often cause severe problems during transportation, handling, or storing. The corresponding waste of energy globally adds up to an estimated 500 billion dollar each year. A lot of hands-on experience has been applied already to industrial applications, but the persistence of the problems with granular matter indicates that there is a great demand for fundamental research to get a better understanding of the underlying physics. The research described in this thesis focuses specifically on the collective phenomena observed in vertically shaken granular matter. In this study experiment, numerical simulation and theory are combined. The central question is to what extent hydrodynamic-like models can describe the phenomena observed in granular systems.