Rheology of suspensions of high aspect ratio non-Brownian rods

The topic that the project will focus on is the physics and engineering of flowing suspensions. Specifically, the rheology of suspensions of high aspect ratio non-Brownian rods.

The complex behaviour of granular suspension flows poses a large problem in the manufacturing of crop protection products. There has been lots of progress in the understanding of suspensions in the last decade, but this has been almost exclusively towards understanding monosized spheres. A common form however in an industrial setting is a suspension of rods.

It is not yet possible to make predictions about these materials leading to questions about their maximum packing fraction, effect of aspect ratio etc. Knowledge of these factors could lead to improvements in the designs of the manufacturing equipment and reaction conditions that allow for desirable flow properties to be obtained, improving the economy of the processes.

This project will aim to use numerical means to establish a relationship between the rod geometry and the bulk rheology of the suspension. These simulations could directly guide the understanding of important industrial processes and feed into the challenge of relating the formation to the flow behaviour of the various stages of crop protection product production. The results will also provide new insights into the physics and rheology of dense non-Brownian suspensions.