LAMMPS parallelization issue causing non-physical behaviors

Hello,

I have a granular simulation of an intruding plate that is producing non-physical behavior that seems to be caused by the way the bed is divided for parallelization. It seems to create artificial ‘boundaries’ throughout the granular media that then spur all sorts of non-physical behavior. The most evident is peaks that form at the surface, shown in the image included below.

If anybody has suggestions for what could cause these issues, I would be very curious to learn more.

Thank you for your time,

Peter

How do you find out that these are caused by parallization?