Visualizing stick–slip: experimental
observations of processes governing the
nucleation of frictional sliding
S M Rubinstein, G Cohen and J Fineberg
The Racah Institute of Physics, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Givat Ram, Jerusalem, Israel
E-mail: jay@vms.huji.ac.il
Received 8 January 2009, in final form 13 April 2009
Published 22 October 2009
Online at stacks.iop.org/JPhysD/42/214016
Abstract
Understanding the dynamics of frictional motion is essential to fields ranging from
nano-machines to the study of earthquakes. Frictional motion involves a huge range of time
and length scales, coupling the elastic fields of two blocks under stress to the dynamics of the
myriad interlocking microscopic contacts that form the interface at their plane of separation.
In spite of the immense practical and fundamental importance of friction, many aspects of the
basic physics of the problem are still not well understood. One such aspect is the nucleation of
frictional motion commonly referred to as the transition from static to dynamic friction. Here
we review experimental studies of dynamical aspects of frictional sliding. We focus mainly on
recent advances in real-time visualization of the real area of contact along large spatially
extended interfaces and the importance of rapid fracture-like processes that appear at the onset
of frictional instability.
(Some figures in this article