Kr. Rajagopal et al., MODELING ELECTRORHEOLOGICAL MATERIALS THROUGH MIXTURE THEORY, International journal of engineering science, 32(3), 1994, pp. 481-500
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.