Random sequential packing simulations in three dimensions for aligned cubes

Abstract

This particular three-dimensional random packing limit problem is to determine the mean fraction of a cubic space that would be occupied by aligned, fixed, equalsize cubes, placed at random locations sequentially until no more can be added. No analytical solution has yet been found for this problem. Simulation results for a finite region and finite number of attempts were extrapolated to an infinite number of attempts (N →∞) in an infinite region by multiple linear regression, using volume fraction occupied (F) as a linear combination of the ratio of the length of the small cube sides (S) to the length of the cubic region side (L) and the cube root of the ratio of the region volume to the total volume of cubes tried, (L3/NS3)⅓. These results for random packing in a volume with penetrable walls can be adjusted with a multiplicative correction factor to give the results for impenetrable walls. A total of N = 107 attempts at placement were made for L/S = 20/1 and N = 14 × 106 attempts were made for L/S = 10/1. The results for volume fraction packed are correlated by F = 0.430(±0.008) + 0.966(±0.072)(S/L) – 0.236(±0.029)(L3/NS)⅓. The numbers in parentheses are twice the standard errors of estimate of the coefficients, indicating the 95% confidence intervals due to random errors. This value for the packing density limit, 0.430 ± 0.008, is slightly larger than that given by a conjecture by Palásti [10], 0.4178. Our value is consistent with that obtained by rather different simulation methods by Jodrey and Tory [8], 0.4227 ± 0.0006, and by Blaisdell and Solomon [2], 0.4262.