The behavior of jammed packings under correlated random forces

Mean-field calculations suggest that the response of a system to global shear and random forces are essentially equivalent in infinite dimensions. However, it remains an open question whether this is true for systems in lower dimensions. To address this, Morse and collaborators have recently developed a method for driving 2D jammed packings of disks quasti-statically, with random, infinitely-persistent, active forces, and found striking similarities and differences between sheared and actively forced systems. Here, we extend that previous work by studying how changing correlation length of the random forcing affects the mechanical response. We find that both the effective modulus with respect to the random forcing direction, as well as the average effective strain between rearrangements or saddle points, does change systematically with correlation length. This paves the way for a deeper understanding of the connection between shear and active driving in lower dimensions.