TAILORING FLOW PROPERTIES OF SOFT COLLOIDAL ASSEMBLIES AND MIXTURES

by Daniele Parisi (FORTH-IESL University of Crete- Department of Materials Science and Technology)

Monday 15 Jan 2018, 14:30 → 15:30 Europe/Rome

Aula 5 (Dip. di Fisica - Edificio E.- Fermi)

Soft colloidal suspensions have been receiving more and more attention over the years. The departure from hard-particles can be considered an effective way to tailor the flow properties of daily products at molecular level. In this work, changes in particle architecture and shape, mixtures of different colloidal particles will be presented as a way to tune the degree of softness, hence, particles interaction potential, packing conditions, and consequently the viscoelastic properties such as relaxation times, and yielding point, at wish.  Scattering techniques such as light, X-rays and neutron are used for determining both static and dynamic properties of the investigated systems and accurate rheological experimental protocols have been developed to ensure reproducibility and reliability of the data. Eventually, comparisons against relevant data in the literature with hard and soft spheres, as well as hard and soft anisotropic particles are made in order to attempt at extracting a generic phenomenological picture of rheology vs. shape and concentration.