Microstructure and shear modulus in concentrated dispersions of bidisperse charged spherical colloids

Abstract

We examine rigorous computations on microstructural as well as rheological properties of concentrated dispersions of bidisperse colloids. The NVT Monte Carlo simulation is applied to obtain the radial distribution function for the concentrated system. The long-range electrostatic interactions between dissimilar spherical colloids are determined using the singularity method, which provides explicit solutions to the linearized electrostatic field. The increasing trend of osmotic pressure with increasing total particle concentration is reduced as the concentration ratio between large and small particles is increased. From the estimation of total structure factor, we observe the strong correlations developed between dissimilar spheres. As the particle concentration increases at a given ionic strength, the magnitude of the first peak in structure factors increases and also moves to higher wave number values. The increase of electrostatic interaction between same charged particles caused by the Debye screening effect provides an increase in both the osmotic pressure and the shear modulus. The higher volume fraction ratio providing larger interparticle spacing yields decreasing high frequency limit of the shear modulus, due to decreasing the particle interaction energy.