Team models sudden thickening of complex fluids
Thursday, January 16, 2014 - 12:31
in Physics & Chemistry
(Phys.org)—A new model by a team of researchers with The City College of New York's Benjamin Levich Institute may shed new understanding on the phenomenon known as discontinuous shear thickening (DST), in which the resistance to stirring takes a sudden jump. Easily observed in a 'kitchen experiment' by mixing together equal amounts of cornstarch and water, DST occurs because concentrated suspensions of hard particles in a liquid respond differently than normal fluids to shear forces.