An assembly of spheroidal particles in Hertzian contact should display an elastic modulus proportional to P 1/3 (where P is the pressure). We consider here a system where each particle (diameter d ) is covered with a soft shell (thickness e , modulus μ) while the inside is rigid. This soft shell may, in practice, be an oxide layer. We then expect ∼ P 1/2 for a large range of pressures, in agreement with experiment. We also discuss the average conductance , assuming a small conductance in the soft shell, but ignoring tunnel effects. Then ∼ P 1/2 .
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P. G. de Gennes (1996) studied this question.
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