Aging of colloid-polymer mixtures
RetourAdding non adsorbing polymer to a colloidal suspension allows us to tune the colloid-colloid interaction through depletion interaction. This gives rise to a rich phase diagram with two types of glasses (attractive and repulsive), a liquid, and a gel phase.
We found that the aging of suspensions change greatly depending on the phase the system is in. If liquids show no time dependence, gels present drastic drop of viscosity and elasticity at long time, while the elasticity of attractive glasses increases with time. Finally, glasses of hard sphere present a more subtle time dependence. These different behaviours relate to the evolution of the microstructure of the suspensions.