Discontinuous shear thickening in Brownian suspensions

Abstract

Discontinuous shear thickening in dense suspensions naturally emerges from the activation of frictional forces by shear flow in non-Brownian systems close to jamming. Yet, this physical picture is incomplete as most experiments study soft colloidal particles subject to thermal fluctuations. To characterize discontinuous shear thickening in colloidal suspensions, we use computer simulations to provide a complete description of the competition between athermal jamming, frictional forces, thermal motion, particle softness, and shear flow. We intentionally neglect hydrodynamics, electrostatics, lubrication, and inertia, but can nevertheless achieve quantitative agreement with experimental findings. In particular, shear thickening corresponds to a crossover between frictionless and frictional jamming regimes which is controlled by thermal fluctuations and particle softness and occurs at a softness dependent Péclet number. We also explore the consequences of our findings for constant pressure experiments, and critically discuss the reported emergence of "S-shaped" flow curves. Our work provides the minimal ingredients to quantitatively interpret a large body of experimental work on discontinuous shear thickening in colloidal suspensions.