Abstract
An energy-based, phase field model is developed for the coupling of two incompressible, immiscible complex fluid phases, in particular a nematic liquid crystal phase in a viscous fluid phase. The model consists of a system of coupled nonlinear partial differential equations for conservation of mass and momentum, phase transport, and interfacial boundary conditions. An efficient and easy-to-implement numerical scheme is developed and implemented to extend two benchmark fluid mechanical problems to incorporate a liquid crystal phase: filament breakup under the influence of capillary force and the gravity-driven, dripping faucet. We explore how the distortional elasticity and nematic anchoring at the liquid crystal-air interface modify the capillary instability in both problems. For sufficiently weak distortional elasticity, the effects are perturbative of viscous fluid experiments and simulations. However, above a Frank elasticity threshold, the model predicts a transition to the beads-on-a-string phenomenon associated with polymeric fluid filaments.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 1-14 |
Number of pages | 14 |
Journal | Journal of Computational Physics |
Volume | 236 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Mar 1 2013 |
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Numerical Analysis
- Modeling and Simulation
- Physics and Astronomy (miscellaneous)
- General Physics and Astronomy
- Computer Science Applications
- Computational Mathematics
- Applied Mathematics