Mesoscopic lattice Boltzmann modeling of flowing soft systems

TL;DR

This paper introduces a mesoscopic lattice Boltzmann model for soft systems that captures complex behaviors like aging, caging, and flow in disordered liquids and soft-glassy materials through multi-component interactions.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel multi-component lattice Boltzmann model incorporating short-range and mid-range interactions to simulate complex soft matter dynamics.

Findings

Reproduces long-time relaxation and caging effects.

Shows anomalous viscosity in simulated systems.

Captures aging and flow behaviors in soft-glassy materials.

Abstract

A mesoscopic multi-component lattice Boltzmann model with short-range repulsion between different species and short/mid-ranged attractive/repulsive interactions between like-molecules is introduced. The interplay between these composite interactions gives rise to a rich configurational dynamics of the density field, exhibiting many features of disordered liquid dispersions (micro-emulsions) and soft-glassy materials, such as long-time relaxation due to caging effects, anomalous enhanced viscosity, ageing effects under moderate shear and flow above a critical shear rate.