Shear-induced criticality near a liquid-solid transition of colloidal suspensions

Abstract

We investigate colloidal suspensions under shear flow through numerical experiments. By measuring the time-correlation function of a bond-orientational order parameter, we find a divergent time scale near a transition point from a disordered fluid phase to an ordered fluid phase, where the order is characterized by a nonzero value of the bond-orientational order parameter. We also present a phase diagram in the $(ρ, \dotγ^{\mathrm{ex}})$ plane, where $ρ$ is the density of the colloidal particles and $\dotγ^{\mathrm{ex}}$ is the shear rate of the solvent. The transition line in the phase diagram terminates at the equilibrium transition point, while a critical region near the transition line vanishes continuously as $\dotγ^{\mathrm{ex}} \rightarrow 0$.