Related papers: Nano-silica based Aqueous Colloidal Gels as Eco-fr…
The limitations of conventional mineral oil-based lubricants motivate the development of environmentally benign emulsions capable of providing lubrication and heat dissipation in demanding applications. In this study, nano-organoclay…
Precise control over the flow behavior of liquids is a critical problem and is demanding for multifaceted applications. Introducing surface-engineered nanoparticles into the liquid can tune the flow behavior. However, the extent of…
In this work, we study the rheological behavior of colloidal dispersion of charge-screened nanoparticles of silica suspended in aqueous media that exhibits soft solid-like consistency. We observe that the system shows various…
This study focuses on the interaction of colloidal silica nanoparticles with the magnetite (Fe3O4) magnetic fluids (MF), which eventually forms nanorod like structure. The aqueous magnetic fluid consists of magnetite nanoparticles having…
The antagonistic effect of processing and thermal annealing on both the filler structure and the polymer matrix is explored in polymer nanocomposites based on natural rubber with precipitated silica incorporated by coagulation from aqueous…
The properties of suspensions of fine particles in dielectric liquid (electrorheological fluids) subjected to an electric field lead to a drastic change of the apparent viscosity of the fluid. For high applied fields (~ 3-5 kV/mm) the…
We used single-molecule tracking to probe the local rheology of interfacial water. Fluorescent rhodamine molecules were tracked on silica surfaces as a function of ambient relative humidity, which controlled the thickness of condensed water…
Frictional losses are responsible for significant energy waste in many practical applications, and superlubricity with a coefficient of friction lower than 0.01 is the goal of tribologists. In this paper, metal-on-polymer contact was…
Hypothesis: Slippery Omniphobic Covalently Attached Liquids (SOCAL) have been proposed for making omnirepellent thin films of self-assembled dimethylsiloxane polymer brushes grafted from silica surfaces. Smooth and flat at very small scale,…
Micro- and nanogels are widely used to stabilise emulsions and simultaneously implement their responsiveness to the external stimuli. One of the factors that improves the emulsion stability is the nanogel softness. Here, we study how the…
Colloidal gels, where nanoscale particles aggregate into an elastic yet fragile network, are at the heart of materials that combine specific optical, electrical and mechanical properties. Tailoring the viscoelastic features of colloidal…
An aqueous suspension of silica nanoparticles or nanofluid can alter the wettability of surfaces, specifically by making them hydrophilic and oil-repellent under water. Wettability alteration by nanofluids have important technological…
We present a nanocomposite gel that efficiently adsorbs a toxic and non-biodegradable cationic dye (methylene blue) from water. This nanocomposite gel is synthesized using chitosan, silica, and titanium dioxide nanoparticles (TiO2 NPs) as…
Cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) are naturally-derived nanostructures of growing importance for the production of composites having attractive mechanical properties, and offer improved sustainability over purely petroleum-based alternatives.…
Cells offer numerous inspiring examples where proteins and membranes combine to form complex structures that are key to intracellular compartmentalization, cargo transport, and specialization of cell morphology. Despite this wealth of…
Spinodal demixing of systems into two phases having very different viscosities leads to viscoelastic networks, i.e. gels. Here we consider demixing in a colloidal system where one phase is a nematic liquid crystal with a strongly…
The mechanical properties of non-vulcanized natural rubber and dialyzed natural rubber-clay nanocomposites have been studied by uniaxial deformations to evaluate the reinforcement efficiency of the clay. We show that while non-rubber…
To prevent the flocculation and phase separation of nanoparticles in solution, nanoparticles are often functionalized with short chain surfactants. Here we present fully-atomistic molecular dynamics simulations which characterize how these…
We study colloidal gels formed by competing electrostatic repulsion and short-range attraction by means of extensive numerical simulations under external shear. We show that, upon varying the repulsion strength, the gel structure and its…
Multi-walled hollow nanoparticles made from tungsten disulphide (WS$_2$) show exceptional tribological performance as additives to liquid lubricants due to effective transfer of low shear strength material onto the sliding surfaces. Using a…