Abstract:

Time-dependent hydrodynamic interactions in a colloidal suspension of hard spheres are studied, both experimentally and through computer simulation. The focus is on the behavior at small wave vectors, which directly probes the temporal evolution of hydrodynamic interactions between nearby particles. The computer simulations show that the time-dependent diffusion coefficient has the same functional form for all wave vectors, with a single characteristic scaling time for each length scale and for each volume fraction. Wave-vector-averaged effective diffusion coefficients, measured experimentally using diffusing wave spectroscopy, also scale to the same functional form. In this case, the scaling time is dependent on both volume fraction and particle size; it decreases sharply with decreasing particle radius, reflecting the greater contribution from smaller wave vectors that is contained in the scattering from the smaller particles. For a direct comparison of simulation and experiment, we simulate the experimentally observed correlation functions, by averaging the wavevector-dependent computer-simulation data with the weighting appropriate to the experimental technique. Although the overall scaling is similar, there are quantitative differences in the simulated and measured relaxation times. We suggest these differences are due to the compressibility of the suspension, and that the resultant pressure waves make an unexpectedly significant contribution to the hydrodynamic interactions.

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