Pathways to Elastic Turbulence in Giant Micelles Through Curvature Ratios in Taylor-Couette Flow

Abstract

In the past fifteen years, flow instabilities reminiscent of the Taylor-like instabilities driven by hoop stresses, have been observed in wormlike micelles based on surfactant molecules. In particular, purely elastic instabilities and turbulence have been shown to develop on top of shear banding, a type of flow specific to the semi-dilute and concentrated regimes. These instabilities have been identified as the origin of the large body of data showing complex spatio-temporal fluctuations, collected in shear-banded systems using multiple experimental techniques. Different categories of banding have been suggested depending on their stability, which involve intrinsic properties of the system and streamline curvature. It has been shown qualitatively that instabilities are promoted by an increase of the surfactant concentration or of the curvature of the flow geometry, while an increase in temperature stabilizes the flow. Here, using benchmark shear banding micellar systems, we quantify, for the first time, the effect of the streamline curvature on these flow instabilities, focusing more specifically on the transition towards purely elastic turbulence. Using various optical visualizations, we identify two transitional pathways to elastic turbulence. We construct a generic state diagram in a parameter space based on the curvature ratio and the Weissenberg number. The nature -- supercritical \textit{vs} subcritical -- of the transition to elastic turbulence is discussed. The stress evolution is in favor of a change of nature from subcritical to supercritical transition as the curvature ratio increases. However we show that finite size effects cannot be neglected and may smooth artificially the stress response. Furthermore, each domain of this diagram is characterized using velocimetry measurements. Finally a scaling for the onset of elastic turbulence is determined.