| Summary: | Dense assemblies of granular and colloidal particles and molecules often fall out of thermal equilibrium and freeze in disordered solid-like configurations which lack the periodicity of crystals or the randomness of gases. This lack of spatial symmetries prevents us from understanding their mechanical and transport properties via traditional solid-state theoretical approaches. It makes predicting and rationalizing the properties of these out-of-equilibrium materials a significant challenge. In my thesis, I explore the properties of two such classes of disordered systems: granular systems and glasses. I (i) demonstrate that friction induces a novel unreported phenomenon in granular columns, (ii) rationalize how structural disorder affects the elastic properties of solids, (iii) clarify the physical original of the anomalous vibrational properties of disordered solids.
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