Creeping-flow rotation of a slip spheroid about its axis of revolution

Abstract

The problem of rotation of a rigid spheroidal particle about its axis of revolution in a viscous fluid is studied analytically and numerically in the steady limit of negligible Reynolds number. The fluid is allowed to slip at the surface of the particle. The general solution for the fluid velocity in prolate and oblate spheroidal coordinates can be expressed in an infinite-series form of separation of variables. The slip boundary condition on the surface of the rotating particle is applied to this general solution to determine the unknown coefficients of the leading orders, which can be numerical results obtained from a boundary collocation method or explicit formulas derived analytically. The torque exerted on the spheroidal particle by the fluid is evaluated for various values of the slip parameter and aspect ratio of the particle. The agreement between our hydrodynamic torque results and the available analytical solutions in the limiting cases is good. It is found that the torque exerted on the rotating spheroid normalized by that on a sphere with radius equal to the equatorial radius of the spheroid increases monotonically with an increase in the axial-to-radial aspect ratio for a no-slip or finite-slip spheroid and vanishes for a perfectly slip spheroid. For a spheroid with a specified aspect ratio, the torque is a monotonically decreasing function of the slip capability of the particle.