Non-linear rheology of lamellar liquid crystals

Abstract

We measure the non-linear relation between the shear stress and shear rate in the lyotropic lamellar phase of C12E5/water system. The measured shear thinning exponent changes with the surfactant concentration. A simple rheology theory of a lamellar or smectic phase is proposed with a prediction gamma approximately sigma3/2, where gamma is the shear rate and sigma is the shear stress. We consider that the shear flow passed through the defect structure causes the main dissipation. As the defect line density varies with the shear rate, the shear thinning arises. The defect density is estimated by the dynamic balance between the production and annihilation processes. The defect production is caused by the shear-induced layer undulation instability. The annihilation occurs through the shear-induced defect collision process. Further flow visualization experiment shows that the defect texture correlates strongly with the shear thinning exponent.