The Brazil nut effect is a common name for the phenomenon where large particles tend to rise to the top of a mixture when it’s shaken. It’s also the subject of the latest FYFD video, which you can see above.
I’ve seen other mentions of the topic previously, but when I started researching the literature, I discovered that the Brazil nut effect was much more complicated than I’d thought! Hopefully, you’ll find the results as interesting as I did. And if you want to dig further, there are links to the papers I used over on YouTube.
Filming was also interesting this time around. I tried out stop-motion animation for the first time. It takes so much patience! But I think the results are so cute. (Image and video credit: N. Sharp/FYFD)