title: Continuum percolation of congruent overlapping spherocylinders.
abstract: Continuum percolation of randomly orientated congruent overlapping spherocylinders (composed of cylinder of height H with semispheres of diameter D at the ends) with aspect ratio α=H/D in [0,∞) is studied. The percolation threshold ϕ_{c}, percolation transition width Δ, and correlation-length critical exponent ν for spherocylinders with α in [0, 200] are determined with a high degree of accuracy via extensive finite-size scaling analysis. A generalized excluded-volume approximation for percolation threshold with an exponent explicitly depending on both aspect ratio and excluded volume for arbitrary α values in [0,∞) is proposed and shown to yield accurate predictions of ϕ_{c} for an extremely wide range of α in [0, 2000] based on available numerical and experimental data. We find ϕ_{c} is a universal monotonic decreasing function of α and is independent of the effective particle size. Our study has implications in percolation theory for nonspherical particles and composite material design.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Soft Matter Mechanics, College of Mechanics and Materials, Hohai University, Nanjing 211100, People's Republic of China.|State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of Water Cycle in River Basin, China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, Beijing 100048, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Wenxiang
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: Institute of Soft Matter Mechanics, College of Mechanics and Materials, Hohai University, Nanjing 211100, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Xianglong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Su
authors.affiliation: Materials Science and Engineering, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona 85287, USA.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Jiao