MODELING ELECTRORHEOLOGICAL MATERIALS THROUGH MIXTURE THEORY

Electro-rheological materials are suspensions of particles in non-cond ucting fluids, and all models that have been developed to date describ e their behavior by treating them as a homogenized single continuum, a nd ignoring the multicomponent structure of the material. The theory o f interacting continua is ideally suited for modeling such mixtures an d in this paper we present a simple theory which takes into account th e distribution of the particles in the fluid, the applied electric fie ld, and the relative motion of the two constituents. To illustrate the utility of such a theory we study the flow of an electro-rheological material between two parallel plates under the application of an elect rical field normal to the plates.