Dynamics of the colloidal suspensions

Abstract

This article offers a survey on our current knowledge of the dynamics of the colloidal suspension, where each particle experiences the friction force with solvent, hydrodynamic interaction, and potential force from surrounding particles and thermodynamic force. It further contains a summary of the basic concepts about microstructures and equilibrium properties, and of analytical and numerical methods, which are relevant for the theoretical description of the suspensions. The description of the dynamics of colloidal particles, based on the generalized Smoluchowski equation, is justified for the time scale accessible in DLS experiments. The combined influence of hard sphere or electrostatic potential and solvent-mediated hydrodynamic interaction on the short-time dynamics of monodisperse suspensions is investigated in detail. A thorough study of tracer-diffusion in hard sphere and charge-stabilized suspensions is presented. Mean-square displacements and long-time tracer-diffusion coefficients are calculated with two alternative approximations, i.e., a mode-coupling scheme and a single relaxation time ansatz.