Foam analogy in charged colloidal crystals

William Kung, P. Ziherl, Randall D. Kamien
2002 Physical review. E, Statistical physics, plasmas, fluids, and related interdisciplinary topics  
We model charged colloidal suspensions using an analogy with foams. We study the solid--solid phase transitions of these systems as a function of particle volume-fraction and ionic strength. The screened Coulomb interaction is replaced by an interaction between walls of the Voronoi cells around each particle. We fit the surface charge to reproduce the phase diagram for the charged suspension studied by Sirota, et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 62, 1524 (1989)]. With this fit parameter we are able to
more » ... ulate the elastic moduli of the system and find good agreement with the available data.
doi:10.1103/physreve.65.050401 pmid:12059512 fatcat:zelkgn626zghbmd52qji5hwnte