Issue 35, 2020

Collective diffusion coefficient of a charged colloidal dispersion: interferometric measurements in a drying drop

Abstract

In the present work, we use Mach–Zehnder interferometry to thoroughly investigate the drying dynamics of a 2D confined drop of a charged colloidal dispersion. This technique makes it possible to measure the colloid concentration field during the drying of the drop at a high accuracy (about 0.5%) and with a high temporal and spatial resolution (about 1 frame per s and 5 μm per pixel). These features allow us to probe mass transport of the charged dispersion in this out-of-equilibrium situation. In particular, our experiments provide the evidence that mass transport within the drop can be described by a purely diffusive process for some range of parameters for which the buoyancy-driven convection is negligible. We are then able to extract from these experiments the collective diffusion coefficient of the dispersion D(φ) over a wide concentration range φ = 0.24–0.5, i.e. from the liquid dispersed state to the solid glass regime, with a high accuracy. The measured values of D(φ) ≃ 5–12D0 are significantly larger than the simple estimate D0 given by the Stokes–Einstein relation, thus highlighting the important role played by the colloidal interactions in such dispersions.

Graphical abstract: Collective diffusion coefficient of a charged colloidal dispersion: interferometric measurements in a drying drop

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
12 May 2020
Accepted
09 Aug 2020
First published
10 Aug 2020

Soft Matter, 2020,16, 8213-8225

Collective diffusion coefficient of a charged colloidal dispersion: interferometric measurements in a drying drop

B. Sobac, S. Dehaeck, A. Bouchaudy and J. Salmon, Soft Matter, 2020, 16, 8213 DOI: 10.1039/D0SM00860E

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