Size-polydisperse dust in molecular gas: Energy equipartition versus non-equipartition

We investigate numerically and analytically size-polydisperse granular mixtures immersed into a molecular gas. We show that the equipartition of granular temperatures of particles of different sizes is established; however, the granular temperatures significantly differ from the temperature of the molecular gas. This result is surprising since, generally, the energy equipartition is strongly violated in driven granular mixtures. Qualitatively, the obtained results do not depend on the collision model, being valid for a constant restitution coefficient $\varepsilon$, as well as for the $\varepsilon$ for viscoelastic particles. Our findings may be important for astrophysical applications, such as protoplanetary disks, interstellar dust clouds, and comets.

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