Shear Thickening in Polymer Stabilized Colloidal Suspensions

TL;DR

This paper applies an activation model to explain shear thickening in polymer-stabilized colloidal suspensions, linking particle interactions with hydrocluster formation under shear, and predicts shear thickening onset with experimental validation.

Contribution

It extends a previously developed activation model to sterically stabilized colloids, demonstrating its applicability and predictive power for shear thickening behavior.

Findings

Model accurately predicts shear thickening onset.

Hydrocluster formation correlates with shear thickening.

Theoretical predictions align with experimental data.

Abstract

This paper adopts a previously developed activation model of shear thickening, published by the authors, to sterically stabilized colloidal suspensions. When particles arranged along the compression axis of a sheared suspension, they may overcome the repulsive interaction and form hydroclusters associated with shear thickening. Taking advantage of the total interaction potential of polymeric brush coating and van der Waals attraction, the applicability of the activation model is shown within the validity range of a continuum theory. For the comparison with an extensive experimental investigation, where some parameters are not available, the onset of shear thickening can be predicted with realistic assumptions of the model parameters.