I want to show the particle binding between the sand particles. which technique is effective ?(ex. SEM, CT scan)
Bridges That Bind Sand
By CHRISTIAN MEIER
A sandcastle is a complex entity – at least on the inside. That is where grains of sand, water and air combine to form an intricate structure. What holds them together is the subject of research being conducted by Stephan Herminghaus and his team at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization in Göttingen. Their work is also generating knowledge that can be applied in industrial processes, landslide prediction and oil production.
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https://www.mpg.de/798094/W002_Physics-Astronomy_048-055.pdf
The X-ray tomography is very common for this kind of visualisation and could give you very useful results as long as the difference in density of the particle binding and the particles themselves is large enough. For example, in the listed article you can see how XCT can be successfully be used for constitutive modelling of cemented granular materials.
Article A thermomechanical constitutive model for cemented granular ...
You can try XCT for constitutive modeling of your cemented granular materials
You can a prove that via Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) .which use hight zooming (500-10,000) times.
