Sandstorms whipped up by desert winds owe their strength to mid-air collisions between sand grains.
Marcus Carneiro and Hans Herrmann at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and their colleagues used computer simulations to show that without collisions, sand grains whizz along close to the ground or make small hops. But when they encounter each other in the air, a few particles are bounced upwards off their neighbours and are accelerated by the stronger winds that blow higher up. These high-flying 'saltons' ultimately crash into the ground, kicking out sprays of sand that further fuel the storm.
Such collisions can double the amount of material in the air, boosting the quantities that storms carry as they sculpt desert landscapes.
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Sand collisions kick up storms. Nature 500, 256 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/500256a
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/500256a
