Dynamics of the wet granular Leidenfrost phenomenon

By event-driven molecular dynamics simulations, we study the Leidenfrost effect for wet granular matter driven from below. In marked contrast to all earlier studies on other fluids, the dense plug hovering on the hot gas cushion undergoes an undamped oscillation. The location of the Hopf bifurcation leading to this oscillation is strongly dependent on the inelasticity of the grain impacts. The vertical separation into a gas phase with a condensed plug hovering above it is particularly pronounced due to the cohesiveness of the granulate. For sufficiently large system sizes, the Rayleigh-Taylor instability terminates the oscillatory state at late times.