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We investigate the origin of yield stress aging in semi-dense, saline, and turbid suspensions in which structural evolution is rapidly arrested by the formation of thermally irreversible roll-resisting interparticle contacts. By performing optical tweezer (OT) three-point bending tests on particle rods, we show that these contacts yield by overcoming a rolling threshold, the critical bending moment of which grows logarithmically with time. We demonstrate that this time-dependent contact-scale rolling threshold controls the suspension yield stress and its aging kinetics. We identify a simple constitutive relation between the contact-scale flexural rigidity and rolling threshold, which transfers to macroscopic scales. This leads us to establishing a constitutive relation between macroscopic shear modulus and yield stress that is generic for an array of colloidal systems.

The constitutive equations of finite strain poroelasticity at the macroscopic level are recovered from an analysis conducted on a representative elementary volume of porous material open to fluid mass exchanges. The change of scale procedure relies upon the solution of a boundary value problem defined on the solid domain of the representative volume undergoing large elastic strains. Such a micro-macro procedure makes it possible to establish necessary and sufficient conditions ensuring the validity of an “effective stress” formulation of the constitutive equations of finite strain poroelasticity. The particular but important case of an incompressible solid matrix is shown to satisfy these conditions.

The macroscopic mechanical behaviour of unsaturated porous media under isothermal conditions is studied within the framework of upscaling techniques. First the main features of the homogenization method are recalled. Then, the macroscopic state equation including the capillary effects is derived. Finally, a morphological model is used in order to clarify the link between the sorbtion-desorbtion hysteretic phenomena and the macroscopic mechanical behaviour.

International audience; Whereas size reduction that accompanies new technologies calls for more complex and more constrained shapes for foams to be used as seals, ribbons or surface coatings, little is known about the mechanics of foam systems characterized by a potentially small number of pores across their thickness and possessing parietal or free surface pore layers. Elastic stiffness and rupture stress have been measured for open-cell foam ribbons produced thanks to a method allowing to tune finely and independently several crucial parameters: ribbon thickness, pore size and solid volume fraction. Results reveal that the longitudinal elastic stiffness of foam ribbons increases significantly as the number of pores across the ribbon thickness decreases within the range 1-10. This increase is understood through the contribution of the parietal layers with respect to the bulk layers. Similarly, rupture stress of foam ribbons characterized by narrow pore size distributions increases as a function of the ratio pore size/ribbon thickness. All others things being equal, the rupture stress is smaller polydisperse samples compared to monodisperse samples.

International audience; We experimentally study the behavior of suspensions of silica particles in aqueous solution. Despite many studies on these materials, the dependence of the overall rheological properties of the suspension on particle size, solid volume fraction, ionic strength, and strain history remains debated. In this paper, we manage to manufacture materials and develop procedures that allow us (i) to approach this problem in the best possible way and (ii) to check that the results obtained with well controlled systems (monodisperse silica spherical particles) also apply to less controlled suspensions (crushed silica particles). We find that the elastic modulus-particle size and yield stress-particle size relationships follow power laws that disagree with classical models from the literature. We also show that elastic modulus versus yields stress data fall on a single master curve when rescaled by particle size, whatever are solid volume fraction, resting time, and ionic strength. This suggests that the rescaled elastic modulus can play the role of a parameter in a structural kinetics model of the behavior of thixotropic suspensions. Furthermore confocal observations of the system provided evidence that the evolution of the overall properties of the material with resting time cannot be ascribed to changes in the particle network.

International audience; From direct observations and MRI measurements we demonstrate that during the drying of a direct (oil in water) emulsion the whole system essentially concentrates homogeneously, which leads to shrinkage, without air penetration. The structure and mechanical strength (i.e. the elastic modulus) of this concentrated bulk are not significantly different from those of an emulsion directly prepared at this higher concentration. Despite this phenomenon, the drying rate continuously and rapidly decreases as the water content decreases, in contrast with the drying of a simple granular packing. This results from a concentration gradient which develops towards the free surface of the sample where the oil droplets finally coalesce, ultimately forming an oil layer covering the sample through which the water molecules have to diffuse before evaporating. Moreover, as during the process, the liquid is transported towards the free surface where it evaporates, surfactants accumulate and tend to form a thin solid layer below the oil layer, which tends to further reduce the drying rate.

International audience; The steady shear viscosity of bubbly suspensions is known to depend upon the suspending fluid viscosity, the bubble volume fraction and a dimensionless number (the capillary number) accounting for the deformability of the bubbles under a viscous stress. However, experimental data on bubbly suspensions in the literature are scarce and present two main shortcomings: (i) the studied systems are polydisperse, which leads to arbitrariness in the definition of a capillary number, and (ii) there is a lack of data for capillary numbers of order unity, where bubbles are slightly deformable. This leads to the absence of clear conclusion on the relevance of the existing theoretical models. In order to make significant progress, an original device is designed to produce monodisperse suspensions of bubbles in a highly viscous Newtonian fluid. The steady shear viscosity of the bubbly suspensions is measured in the dilute and semi-dilute concentration regimes (volume fraction of bubbles between 2% and 18%) using a Couette geometry with a 20-bubbles-wide gap, for capillary numbers ranging between 0.01 and 10. The new obtained data are shown to be much more accurate than data previously reported in the literature. Experimental data are in very good agreement with the model of Frankel and Acrivos (1970), originally developed for dilute suspensions, in the whole range of studied volume fractions.

International audience; We study numerically the pair trajectories of rigid circular particles in a two dimensional inertialess simple shear flow of a (Binghamian) yield stress fluid. We use a Lagrange multiplier based fictitious domain method, following Glowinski et al. [26, 28, 29], for solving the problem. Contacts between the particles at a finite interparticle distance interpreted as a roughness are taken into account with the da Cunha and Hinch [12] model. Another model, introduced by Glowinski et al. [27], is shown to provide similar results in the limit of infinite contact stiffness. Due to the nonlinear behavior of the suspending fluid, it is found that the trajectories of the particles depend on the shear rate, the relevant dimensionless parameter being here the Bingham number, which compares plastic forces to viscous forces. In absence of interparticle contacts, fore-aft symmetry is observed in all cases; however, the particles are found to come closer to each other as the Bingham number is increased: the plastic behavior of the suspending fluid decreases the range of hydrodynamic interactions. As contacts are introduced, fore-aft asymmetry is observed. Plastic effects are found to enhance surface roughness effects: contacts between particles occur for smaller surface roughness at large Bn. Moreover, the magnitude of the asymmetry is increased as the Bingham number is increased. These observations may explain why the microstructure of suspensions of particles in a yield stress fluid is shear-rate-dependent [45] leading to a complex nonlinear macroscopic behavior.

International audience; Shear viscosity of bubbly liquids is known to depend on both the gas volume fraction and the capillary number. Here we study the impact of confinement on their behavior by investigating the viscosity of semi-dilute bubbly liquid layers confined between two plates and characterized by a ratio of the undeformed bubble diameter to the layer thickness equal or larger than unity. For all the studied confinement ratios viscosity is shown to be smaller than the viscosity of the suspending liquid for capillary numbers larger than 0.1. Measurements of bubble deformations show that this behavior is related to bubble stretching in the direction of shear induced flow. In the limit of high capillary numbers, viscosity reaches values predicted for unconfined bubbly liquids. On the other hand, our results for smaller capillary numbers, i.e. within the range 0.001-0.1, reveal a non-monotonic variation of the viscosity as a function of the confinement ratio, exhibiting a well-defined maximum value for ratio close to 1.8. This behavior differs strongly from the reference case of unconfined bubbly liquid, and it is shown to result from both bulk and wall drag forces for the squeezed bubbles.

International audience; We devise a hybrid low-order method for Bingham pipe flows, where the velocity is discretized by means of one unknown per mesh face and one unknown per mesh cell which can be eliminated locally by static condensation. The main advantages are local conservativity and the possibility to use polygonal/polyhedral meshes. We exploit this feature in the context of adaptive mesh refinement to capture the yield surface by means of local mesh refinement and possible coarsening. We consider the augmented Lagrangian method to solve iteratively the variational inequalities resulting from the discrete Bingham problem, using piecewise constant fields for the auxiliary variable and the associated Lagrange multiplier. Numerical results are presented in pipes with circular and eccentric annulus cross-section for different Bingham numbers.

International audience; In this paper, we study how the permeability of solid foam is modified by the presence of membranes that close partially or totally the cell windows connecting neighboring pores. The finite element method (FEM) simulations computing the Stokes problem are performed at both pore and macroscopic scales. For foam with fully interconnected pores, we obtain a robust power-law relationship between permeability and aperture size. This result is due to the local pressure drop mechanism through the aperture as described by Sampson for fluid flow through a circular orifice in a thin plate. Based on this local law, pore-network simulation of simple flow is used and is shown to reproduce FEM results. Then this low computational cost method is used to study in detail the effect of an open window fraction on the percolation properties of the foam pore space. The results clarify the effect of membranes on foam permeability. Finally, Kirkpatrick’s model is adapted to provide analyticalexpressions that allow for our simulation results to be successfully reproduced.

International audience; We study the rheological behavior of suspensions of noncolloidal spheres in yield stress fluids (concentrated emulsions). These are good model systems for understanding, e.g., the rheology of fresh concrete or debris flows, and more generally, the behavior of particles dispersed in any nonlinear material. We use magnetic resonance imaging techniques to investigate the flows of these yield stress suspensions in a concentric-cylinder Couette geometry. We extend the theoretical approach of Chateau et al. [J. Rheol. 52, 489–506 (2008)], valid for isotropic suspensions, to describe suspensions in simple shear flows, in which an anisotropic spatial distribution of particles is induced by flow. Theory and experiments show that the suspensions can be modeled by a Herschel–Bulkley behavior of same index as their interstitial fluid. We characterize the increase of their consistency and their yield stress with the particle volume fraction / in the 0%–50% range. We observe a good agreement between the experimental variations of the consistency with / and the theoretical prediction. This shows that the average apparent viscosity of the sheared interstitial material is correctly estimated and taken into account. We also observe shear-induced migration with similar properties as in a Newtonian fluid, which we predict theoretically, suggesting that particle normal stresses are proportional to the shear stress. However, the yield stress at flow stoppage increases much less than predicted. We also show that new features emerge in the rheology of the yield stress fluid when adding particles. We predict and observe the emergence of a nonzero normal stress difference at the yielding transition. We observe that the yield stress at flow start can differ from the yield stress at flow stoppage, and depends on flow history. It is likely a signature of a shear-dependent microstructure, due to the nonlinear behavior of the interstitial fluid, which makes these materials different from suspensions in Newtonian media. This is confirmed by direct characterization of shear-rate-dependent pair distribution functions using X-ray microtomography. This last observation explains why the theory predictions for the consistency can be correct while failing to model the yield stress at flow stoppage: a unique microstructure was indeed assumed as a first approximation. More sophisticated theories accounting for a shear-dependent microstructure are thus needed.

Biot conference 2017; We investigate the numerical modeling and simulation of mechanical effective properties of disordered foams in 3d. We consider the elasticity, the thermal conductivity as well as the permeability. We present a meshing procedure for the microstructure of randomly disordered wet foams. The material behavior is modeled by constitutive equations and a boundary value problem is set on the microstructure. We present and implement the homogenization approach for the determination of the effective mechanical properties. The local problems are discretized and solved with the finite element method. We investigate the monodisperse and disordered configuration of a wet foam by varying the volume fraction.

International audience; We study the rheological behavior of mixtures of foams and pastes, which can be described as suspensions of bubbles in yield stress fluids. Model systems are designed by mixing monodisperse aqueous foams and concentrated emulsions. The elastic modulus of the suspensions decreases with the bubble volume fraction. This decrease is all the sharper as the elastic capillary number (defined as the ratio of the paste elastic modulus to the bubble capillary pressure) is high, which accounts for the softening of the bubbles as compared to the paste. By contrast, the yield stress of most studied materials is not modified by the presence of bubbles. Their plastic behavior is governed by the plastic capillary number, defined as the ratio of the paste yield stress to the bubble capillary pressure. At low plastic capillary number values, bubbles behave as nondeformable inclusions, and we predict that the suspension dimensionless yield stress should remain close to unity. At large plastic capillary number values, we observe bubble breakup during mixing: bubbles are deformed by shear. Finally, at the highest bubble volume fractions, the yield stress increases abruptly: this is interpreted as a 'foamy yield stress fluid' regime, which takes place when the paste mesoscopic constitutive elements are strongly confined in the films between the bubbles.

International audience; We show that the Rayleigh-Taylor instability in elastoplastic solids takes the form of local perturbations penetrating the material independently of the interface size, in contrast with the theory for simple elastic materials. Then, even just beyond the stable domain, the instability abruptly develops as bursts rapidly moving through the other medium. We show that this is due to the resistance to penetration of a finger which is minimal for a specific finger size and drops to a much lower value beyond a small depth (a few millimeters). The Rayleigh-Taylor instability (RTI) is a well-known instability which occurs when a denser fluid rests on top of a lighter one [1]. As it develops, the two fluids penetrate one another, in the form of fingers. Instability is driven by the density difference and the acceleration to which the fluids are submitted, while surface tension provides a stabilizing effect. In contrast, RTI in solids is much less studied and understood, even though it relates to many application fields and can cause irreversible damage to structures. Examples include metal plates submitted to strong pressure or acceleration in high-energy density physics experiments [2], magnetic implosion of impactor liners [3,4], assessment of solid strength under high strain rate [5], slowly accreting neutron stars [6]. Other applications are found in geology: volcanic island formation [7], salt dome formation [8], and more generally, magmatic diapirism in Earth's mantle and continental crust [9,10], correspond to situations where a liquid opens its way through a layer of denser solid material above it. In most approaches to this problem [7–9,11], the upper material was considered as a highly viscous fluid, which allowed simple simulations of the process, but could also be misleading. Another situation concerns oil well cementing operations, in which yield stress fluids of different densities (drilling muds and cement, e.g.), which behave as solids at rest, may be pumped into the well in an ill-favored density order [12]. The basic approach to RTI for solids assumes linear elastic materials. The problem appears similar to that for simple fluids, except that the role of surface tension effects, neglected for solids, is played by elasticity. For a single solid above a liquid with a (positive) density difference Δρ, the instability criterion (A) is given by gΔρ > 4απG=L, where G and L are the shear modulus and length of the sample, respectively, and g denotes the gravitational acceleration. Depending on boundary conditions, factor α was found to be 1 [3,13], 1.6 [14], or 2 [15]. A couple of experiments on metal plates [16] and with a yogurt [17] provided some support to this theory. From a more complete study [18] using soft elastic solids, the overall validity of this approach was proved but the wavelength was shown to be smaller than expected from theory and dependent on uncontrollable, slight disturbances of the surface [19]. RTI for solids is further complicated by the fact that yielding may occur beyond a critical deformation. So far, this aspect has been considered separately, leading to the conclusion that instability results from a sufficiently large initial perturbation amplitude ε 0 (penetration depth). The instability criterion (B) then reads gΔρ > βτ c =ε 0 , where τ c denotes the material's yield stress (in simple shear), and where 0.5 ≤ β ≤ 2 depending on the sample aspect ratio [13–15,18,24,25]. Some tests with a single material were apparently in agreement with this criterion [17] but the plastic regime for this material was not so well-defined [19]. Finally, it was suggested [2] that elastic and plastic stability criteria should be taken into account successively, and deep theoretical analysis [26] predicted that for plastic materials, once the threshold is reached somewhere, the perturbation grows unlimitedly. These approaches have the advantage of considering independently the elasticity and the yielding effects. However, one cannot exclude that the interplay of both mechanisms could play a crucial role in the early stage of the perturbation growth. Here we aim at clarifying this problem through experiments on well-characterized materials, linearly elastic below a critical deformation and elastoplastic beyond this deformation. We show that the RTI in solids does not develop as predicted by the theory for simple elastic materials, but results from the ability of local perturbations to penetrate the material by involving, from the start, both elastic and plastic effects. At some point during the process, resistance to penetration drops, causing an abrupt

International audience; Direct observations of the surface and shape of model nano-colloidal gels associated with measurements of the spatial distribution of water content during drying show that air starts to significantly penetrate the sample when the material stops shrinking. We show that whether the material fractures or not during desiccation, as air penetrates the porous body, the water saturation decreases but remains almost homogeneous throughout the sample. This air-invasion is at the origin of another type of fracture due to capillary effects; these results provide a new insight in the liquid dynamics at the nano-scale. PACS number(s): 47.56.+r, 68.03.Fg, 81.40.Np

The behaviour of an elastic medium containing unsaturated mesocracks is studied in the framework of micromechanics. The cracks are filled by two immiscible fluids, namely a liquid and a gas, separated by a capillary interface. Furthermore, it is assumed that the set of cracks constitutes a connected network which implies the capillary pressure is uniform over a representative elementary volume. Estimates for macroscopic strains induced by drying are derived with the tools of homogenization for disordered media. The case of an isotropic orientation of cracks in the framework of the dilute approximation is considered. When the aspect ratio is small enough, the macroscopic behavior accounting for crack opening change during drying differs significantly from the results of the linear approach.

International audience; Drops and bubbles wrapped in dense monolayers of hydrophobic particles are known to sustain a significant decrease of their internal pressure. Through dedicated experiments we investigate the collapse behavior of such armored water drops as a function of the particle-to-drop size ratio in the range 0.02-0.2. We show that this parameter controls the behavior of the armor during the deflation: at small size ratios the drop shrinkage proceeds through the soft crumpling of the monolayer, at intermediate ratios the drop becomes faceted, and for the largest studied ratios the armor behaves like a granular arch. The results show that each of the three morphological regimes is characterized by an increasing magnitude of the collapse pressure. This increase is qualitatively modeled thanks to a mechanism involving out-of-plane deformations and particle disentanglement in the armor.

q This issue of the Journal of Non-Newtonian Fluid Mechanics includes a series of papers based on work presented at the international workshop on Viscoplastic fluids: from theory to application, held Nov. 18–21, 2013 in Rueil Malmaison, France. A list of participants is provided in Table 1. This was the fifth biannual meeting on this subject. The previous meetings were held in Banff (Alberta, Canada), Monte Verita (Ascona, Switzerland), Limassol (Cyprus) and Rio de Janeiro (Brasil) [1]. Like previous editions, the aim of the workshop was to bring together leading researchers in the field of viscoplastic fluids across several disciplines to foster the awareness and the transfer of ideas, both from academic research and industry. The program consisted in a single technical session and three invited keynote lectures. A total of 49 talks and 9 posters were presented, spanning fascinating topics from the coating of a viscoplastic fluid on a plate to the numerical simulation of the transition of viscoplastic fluid flows to turbulence. The workshop enjoyed an unprecedented number of 80 participants (Fig. 1), a popularity that emphasizes that viscoplastic fluids are a ''hot'' topic in the field of non-Newtonian Fluid Mechanics. Invited speakers were John Tsamopoulos (University of Patras, Greece), Guillaume Ovarlez (Laboratoire Navier, Universite Paris-Est, France) and Fabrice Toussaint (Lafarge Centre de Recherche, France). John Tsamopoulos opened the meeting with an invited talk on the numerical simulation of yield stress fluid flows and its applications to the problem of the rising of a single bubble. He both elaborated on the technical details of the numerical tools available nowadays for the simulation of this class of flows and provided insight on the effect of elasticity and pressure oscillations. On the second day of the workshop, Guillaume Ovarlez gave an overview on the rheological behavior of suspen-sions of particles and bubbles in a yield stress fluid, illustrating his findings with a large number of experimental results. On the third day, Fabrice Toussaint bridged academic research and industrial concerns in the field of concrete rheometry, ranging from the fundamental behavior of concrete slurries and their characterization in rheometers to the fascinating last i-Phone application designed to tell the truck driver how quick the concrete slurry properties are evolving in the truck's rotating drum while driving to the construction site. Standard talks ranged from experiments, theory to numerical simulations, with an emphasis on the rheolo-gical behavior of carbopol gels and the more general question of how to experimentally characterize yield stress materials with thixotropy, a question that has been mobilizing the attention of the yield stress community for a few decades. The realistic and accurate modelling of the behavior of viscoplastic and thixotropic materials still remains an unsolved question in the field, as already underlined two years before in Rio de Janeiro, but also progress has been made, with new measurement techniques as, e.g., low amplitude oscillatory shear (LAOS). In particular, the workshop featured intense discussions on thixotropy and its mathematical modelling. Efforts in designing new numerical approaches with enhanced accuracy and fast convergence have seemed to slow down and the workshop was an occasion to collectively acknowledge that this research direction should be revived. The workshop took place at IFPEN-Rueil Malmaison, in the suburb of Paris, France. IFPEN is a large national research center in the field of energy, with nice facilities and well designed services. The social program started with an ice-breaking cocktail in a French-style coffee shop named ''Cafe Leffe'' in the heart of Rueil Malmaison, which was a casual occasion to chat with long-term colleagues and enables new participants to VPF to immerse into the yield (no) stress community and yield to the pleasure of enjoying French wines and the warm and friendly atmosphere of

We study the elastic properties of soft solids containing air bubbles. Contrary to standard porous materials, the softness of the matrix allows for a coupling of the matrix elasticity to surface tension forces brought in by the bubbles. Thanks to appropriate experiments on model systems, we show how the elastic response of the dispersions is governed by two dimensionless parameters: the gas volume fraction and a capillary number comparing the elasticity of the matrix to the stiffness of the bubbles. We also show that our experimental results are in good agreement with computations of the shear modulus through a micro-mechanical approach., submitted to Soft Matter

The rheological properties of suspensions of bubbles in yield stress fluids are investigated through experiments on model systems made of monodisperse bubbles dispersed in concentrated emulsions. Thanks to this highly tunable system, the bubble size and the rheological properties of the suspending yield stress fluid are varied over a wide range. We show that the macroscopic response under shear of the suspensions depends on the gas volume fraction and the bubble stiffness in the suspending fluid. This relative stiffness can be quantified through capillary numbers comparing the capillary pressure to stress scales associated with the rheological properties of the suspending fluid. We demonstrate that those capillary numbers govern the decrease of the elastic and loss moduli, the absence of variation of the yield stress and the increase of the consistency with the gas volume fraction, for the investigated range of capillary numbers. Micro-mechanical estimates are consistent with the experimental data and provide insight on the experimental results., Comment: submitted to Journal of non Newtonian Fluid Mechanics

International audience; From NMR measurements we show that the velocity field of a yield stress fluid flowing through a disordered well-connected porous medium is very close to that for a Newtonian fluid. In particular, it is shown that no arrested regions exist even at very low velocities, for which the solid regime is expected to be dominant. This suggests that these results obtained for strongly nonlinear fluid can be extrapolated to any nonlinear fluid. We deduce a generalized form of Darcy's law for such materials and provide insight into the physical origin of the coefficients involved in this expression, which are shown to be moments of the second invariant of the strain rate tensor.

International audience; The behavior of a porous material on which air-solid surface tension effects are not negligible is studied experimentally and theoretically. Overall properties were measured on mixtures of foams and pastes. Theoretical estimates were obtained in the framework of an upscaling approach. It was observed and predicted that the overall properties of the porous medium depend upon the deformability of the pores in the elastic regime whereas in the plastic regime, the porous medium yield stress is the same as the matrix yield stress. Deformability of the pores is accounted for by a capillary number defined as the ratio of the matrix elastic modulus to the pore capillary pressure in the linear regime and as the ratio of the matrix secant modulus to the pore capillary pressure in the non-linear regime. This non-linear capillary number tends toward zero when the plastic plateau is reached.

International audience; Stability of coarse particles against gravity is an important issue in dense suspensions (fresh concrete, foodstuff, etc.). On the one hand, it is known that they are stable at rest when the interstitial paste has a high enough yield stress; on the other hand, it is not yet possible to predict if a given material will remain homogeneous during a flow. Using MRI techniques, we study the time evolution of the particle volume fraction during the flows in a Couette geometry of model density-mismatched suspensions of noncolloidal particles in yield stress fluids. We observe that shear induces sedimentation of the particles in all systems, which are stable at rest. The sedimentation velocity is observed to increase with increasing shear rate and particle diameter, and to decrease with increasing yield stress of the interstitial fluid. At low shear rate ('plastic regime'), we show that this phenomenon can be modelled by considering that the interstitial fluid behaves like a viscous fluid -- of viscosity equal to the apparent viscosity of the sheared fluid -- in the direction orthogonal to shear. The behavior at higher shear rates, when viscous effects start to be important, is also discussed. We finally study the dependence of the sedimentation velocity on the particle volume fraction, and show that its modelling requires estimating the local shear rate in the interstitial fluid.

International audience; When it moves through a yield stress fluid, a solid object continuously reaches and liquefies new solid regions, so that both flow in liquid regions and deformations in solid regions occur. In the present work, we focus on the displacement of a plate through simple yield stress fluids (nonthixotropic). Through force vs velocity and particle imaging velocimetry measurements with a detailed analysis of the deformation history, we are able to identify the solid and liquid regions and their respective role in the flow characteristics. It is shown that the displacement of a long object through a yield stress fluid gives rise to the formation of a liquid boundary layer (BL) of uniform thickness at short distance from the leading edge, while the rest of the material remains solid. The original result is that the thickness of this boundary layer, which is of the order of 10mm, only slightly increases with velocity and does not tend to zero when the velocity tends to zero, in contrast with usual flows of yield stress fluids along solid surfaces. Moreover, it does not change for significant variations of the rheological characteristics of the fluid in its liquid regime. We show that these specific characteristics of the liquid layer are mainly governed by the progressive transition from an elastic solid to a liquid, starting slightly ahead of the leading edge of the plate.

Mixtures of particles of different size are widely used in order to design concrete mixtures containing the maximum amount of solid particles possible that can be readily transported, placed and finished. This chapter provides an overview of the main results of the effects of particle properties on packing characteristics and presents three different models that aim to predict the packing density of a particle mixture. The dependence of the overall rheological properties of highly concentrated suspensions of polydisperse particles on the particle size distribution and particle blend composition is then investigated.

International audience; We study the local flow properties of various materials in a vane-in-cup geometry. We use magnetic resonance imaging techniques to measure velocities and particle concentrations in flowing Newtonian fluid, yield stress fluid, and in a concentrated suspension of noncolloidal particles in a yield stress fluid. In the Newtonian fluid, we observe that the $\theta$-averaged strain rate component $d_{r,\theta}$ decreases as the inverse squared radius in the gap, in agreement with a Couette analogy. This allows direct comparison (without end-effect corrections) of the resistances to shear in vane and Couette geometries. Here, the mean shear stress in the vane-in-cup geometry is slightly lower than in a Couette cell of same dimensions, and a little higher than when the vane is embedded in an infinite medium. We also observe that the flow enters deeply the region between the blades, leading to significant extensional flow. In the yield stress fluid, in contrast with the usually accepted picture based on simulation results from the literature, we find that the layer of material that is sheared near the blades at low velocity is not cylindrical. There is thus a significant extensional component of shear that should be taken into account in the analysis. Finally and surprisingly, in the suspension, we observe that a thin non-cylindrical slip layer made of the pure interstitial yield stress fluid appears quickly at the interface between the sheared material and the material that moves as a rigid body between the blades. This feature can be attributed to the non-symmetric trajectories of the noncolloidal particles around the edges of the blades. This new important observation is in sharp contradiction with the common belief that the vane tool prevents slippage and may preclude the use of the vane tool for studying the flows of pasty materials with large particles.

International audience; We study both experimentally and theoretically the rheological behavior of isotropic bidisperse suspensions of noncolloidal particles in yield stress fluids. We focus on materials in which noncolloidal particles interact with the suspending fluid only through hydrodynamical interactions. We observe that both the elastic modulus and yield stress of bidisperse suspensions are lower than those of monodisperse suspensions of same solid volume fraction. Moreover, we show that the dimensionless yield stress of such suspensions is linked to their dimensionless elastic modulus and to their solid volume fraction through the simple equation of Chateau et al.[J. rheol. 52, 489-506 (2008)]. We also show that the effect of the particle size heterogeneity can be described by means of a packing model developed to estimate random loose packing of assemblies of dry particles. All these observations finally allow us to propose simple closed form estimates for both the elastic modulus and the yield stress of bidisperse suspensions: while the elastic modulus is a function of the reduced volume fraction $\phi/\phi_m$ only, where $\phi_m$ is the estimated random loose packing, the yield stress is a function of both the volume fraction $\phi$ and the reduced volume fraction.

International audience; The behavior of suspensions of rigid particles in a non-Newtonian fluid is studied in the framework of a nonlinear homogenization method. Estimates for the overall properties of the composite material are obtained. In the case of a Herschel-Bulkley suspending fluid, it is shown that the properties of a suspension with overall isotropy can be satisfactory modeled as that of a Herschel-Bulkley fluid with an exponent equal to that of the suspending fluid. Estimates for the yield stress and the consistency at large strain rate levels are proposed. These estimates compare well to both experimental data obtained by Mahaut et al [J. Rheol. 52, 287-313 (2008)] and to experimental data found in the literature.

International audience; The different regimes of flow when separating two solid rough surfaces in contact via a layer of a simple yield stress fluid are identified. Generic scalings for the adhesion energy and for the geometrical characteristics of the final deposits (after separation) as a function of the initial aspect ratio of the sample are found. We show that there is a strong pinning effect which might be at the origin of an adhesion energy significantly larger (by a factor about 2) than that estimated from the lubrication theory. We also observe that the conditions of development of viscous fingering are not at all predicted by the conventional Saffman-Taylor instability theory taking into account the specific non-Newtonian character of the fluid. This again suggests that for pastes the pinning effect plays a significant stabilizing role.

International audience; We investigate the origins of salt damage in sandstones for the two most common salts: sodium chloride and sulfate. The results show that the observed difference in damage between the two salts is directly related to the kinetics of crystallization and the interfacial properties of the salt solutions and crystals with respect to the stone. We show that, for sodium sulfate, the existence of hydrated and anhydrous crystals and specifically their dissolution and crystallization kinetics are responsible for the damage. Using magnetic resonance imaging and optical microscopy we show that when water imbibes sodium sulfate contaminated sandstones, followed by drying at room temperature, large damage occurs in regions where pores are fully filled with salts. After partial dissolution, anhydrous sodium sulfate salt present in these regions gives rise to a very rapid growth of the hydrated phase of sulfate in the form of clusters that form on or close to the remaining anhydrous microcrystals. The rapid growth of these clusters generates stresses in excess of the tensile strength of the stone leading to the damage. Sodium chloride only forms anhydrous crystals that consequently do not cause damage in the experiments.

We review and compare the phenomenological aspects and physical origin of shear-localization and shear-banding in various material types, namely emulsions, suspensions, colloids, granular materials and micellar systems. It appears that shear-banding, which must be distinguished from the simple effect of coexisting static-flowing regions in yield stress fluids, occurs in the form of a progressive evolution of the local viscosity towards two significantly different values in two adjoining regions of the fluids in which the stress takes slightly different values. This suggests that from a global point of view shear-banding in these systems has a common physical origin: two physical phenomena (for example, in colloids, destructuration due to flow and restructuration due to aging) are in competition and, depending on the flow conditions, one of them becomes dominant and makes the system evolve in a specific direction., Comment: The original publication is available at http://www.springerlink.com

International audience; We have investigated the damaging of sandstones in the presence of sodium sulfate during wetting and drying cycles. We have shown that the interfacial properties of the salts play a major role in the process and have elucidated which crystalline phase is responsible for the mechanical damage. We find that damage is due to the transformation of thenardite (anhydrous) to mirabilite (hydrated crystals) during wetting and drying without the complete dissolution of the anhydrous crystals. As the volume change is large, this is likely to be the major cause of the mechanical damage observed in the sandstone. Second, we find that the interfacial properties of the different crystalline phases play a major role on whether the salt solution will effloresce (crystallize on the outer surface of the stone) or subfloresce (crystallize within the stone).

International audience; We study the solid mechanical properties of several thixotropic suspensions as a function of the shear stress history applied during their flow stoppage and their aging in their solid state. We show that their elastic modulus and yield stress depend strongly on the shear stress applied during their solid-liquid transition (i.e., during flow stoppage) while applying the same stress only before or only after this transition may induce only second-order effects: there is negligible dependence of the mechanical properties on the preshear history and on the shear stress applied at rest. We also found that the suspensions age with a structuration rate that hardly depends on the stress history. We propose a physical sketch based on the freezing of a microstructure whose anisotropy depends on the stress applied during the liquid-solid transition to explain why the mechanical properties depend strongly on this stress. This sketch points out the role of the internal forces in the colloidal suspensions' behavior. We finally discuss briefly the macroscopic consequences of this phenomenon and show the importance of using a controlled-stress rheometer.

International audience; We study experimentally the behavior of isotropic suspensions of noncolloidal particles in yield stress fluids. This problem has been poorly studied in the literature, and only on specific materials. In this paper, we manage to develop procedures and materials that allow us to focus on the purely mechanical contribution of the particles to the yield stress fluid behavior, independently of the physicochemical properties of the materials. This allows us to relate the macroscopic properties of these suspensions to the mechanical properties of the yield stress fluid and the particle volume fraction, and to provide results applicable to any noncolloidal particle in any yield stress fluid. We find that the elastic modulus-concentration relationship follows a Krieger-Dougherty law, and we show that the yield stress-concentration relationship is related to the elastic modulus-concentration relationship through a very simple law, in agreement with results from a micromechanical analysis.

We study experimentally and theoretically the behavior of suspensions of noncolloidal particles in yield stress fluids. We develop procedures and materials that allow focusing on the purely mechanical contribution of the particles to the yield stress fiuid behavior, allowing relating the macroscopic properties of these suspensions to the mechanical properties of the yield stress fluid and the particle volume fraction. We find that the elastic modulus/concentration relationship follows a Krieger‐Dougherty law, and show that the yield stress/concentration relationship is related to the elastic modulus/concentration relationship through a very simple law, in agreement with a micromechanical analysis. We finally present evidence for shear‐induced migration in the flows of these suspensions.

International audience; In order to help in modelling the yield stress of fresh concrete, we study the behavior of suspensions of coarse particles in a thixotropic cement paste. Our aim is to relate the yield stress of these mixtures to the yield stress of the suspending cement paste, to the time passed at rest, and to the coarse particle volume fraction. We present here procedures that allow for (i) studying a homogeneous and isotropic suspension, (ii) comparing the yield stress of a given cement paste to that of the same cement paste added with particles, and (iii) accounting for the thixotropy of the cement paste. We observe that the yield stress of these suspensions of cement paste with coarse particles follows the very simple Chateau-Ovarlez-Trung model {[}X. Chateau, G. Ovarlez. K.L. Trung, Homogenization approach to the behavior of suspensions of noncolloidal particles in yield stress fluids, J. Rheol. (2008) 52 489-506.], consistently with the experimental results of Mahaut et al. {[}F. Mahaut, X. Chateau, P. Coussot, G. Ovarlez, Yield stress and elastic modulus of suspensions of noncolloidal particles in yield stress fluids, J. Rheol. (2008) 52 287-313.] obtained with many different particles and suspending yield stress fluids. This consistency between the results obtained in various yield stress fluids shows that the yield stress of the suspension does not depend on the physicochemical properties of the suspending yield stress fluid; it only depends on its yield stress value. This shows that studies of suspensions in model yield stress fluids can be used as a general tool to infer the behavior of fresh concrete. Moreover, we show that the thixotropic structuration rate of the interstitial paste (its static yield stress increase rate in time) is not affected by the presence of the particles. As a consequence, it is sufficient to measure the thixotropic properties of the constitutive cement paste in order to predict the thixotropic structuration rate of a given fresh concrete. This structuration rate is predicted to have the same dependence on the coarse particle volume fraction as the yield stress.

We study the flow of yield stress fluids over a rotating surface when both the viscoelastic solid behavior below a critical deformation (γ c) and liquid properties beyond γ c can play a significant role. We review the detailed characteristics of the flow in the solid regime in the specific case of a pure elongational strain (large height to radius ratio). We, in particular, show that there exists a critical rotation velocity (ω c) associated with the transition from the solid to the liquid regime. We then consider the specific case of lubricational regime (small height to radius ratio) in the liquid regime. In that case we describe the different possible evolutions of the equilibrium shape of the material as a function of the rotation velocity (ω), from which we extrapolate the transient shape evolutions as ω increases. We show that for a sufficiently large rotation velocity the sample separates into two parts, one remaining at rest around the rotation axis, the other going on moving radially. These predictions are then compared with systematic spin-coating tests under increasing rotation velocity ramps followed by a plateau at ω f with typical yield stress fluids. It appears that there exists a critical velocity below which the material undergoes a limited elongation and beyond which it starts to spread significantly over the solid surface. For a larger ω f value the sample forms a thick peripheral roll, leaving behind it a thin layer of fluid at rest relatively to the disc. These characteristics are in qualitative agreement with the theoretical predictions. Beyond a sufficiently large ω f value this roll eventually spreads radially in the form of thin fingers. Moreover, in agreement with the theory in the lubricational regime, the different curves of deformation vs ω fall along a master curve when the rotation velocity is scaled by ω c for different accelerations, different sample radii, or different material yield stress. The final thickness of the deposit seems to be mainly governed by the displacement of the roll, the characteristics of which take their origin in the initial stage of the spreading, including the solid–liquid transition.

International audience; Synopsis We carried out systematic creep tests after different times of rest and over sufficiently long times with pasty materials of various internal structures in a Couette geometry. From an analysis of the data taking into account the inertia of the system and the heterogeneous distribution of stress, we show that: i for a stress below the yield stress these materials remain solid but undergo residual, irreversible deformations over long time which exhibit some trends typical of aging in glassy systems; ii as a result of thixotropy or aging in the solid regime the elastic modulus increases logarithmically with the time of rest; iii in the liquid regime the effective behavior of the material can be well represented by a truncated power-law model; iv a fundamental parameter of the solid-liquid transition is a critical effective shear rate associated with the yield stress below which the material cannot flow steadily.

The fracture of porous media subjected to a constant load is studied. Contrary to homogeneous solids in which fracture usually happens instantaneously at a well-defined breaking strength, the fracture of a porous medium can occur with a delay, allowing us to quantify the average lifetime of the unbroken material. We show that the average fracture probability, a key property for risk analysis in civil engineering, is given by the probability of crack nucleation. The nucleation process can be understood qualitatively by calculating the activation energy for crack nucleation, taking into account the porosity of the medium.

For materials assumed to be simple yield stress fluids the velocity of an object should continuously increase from zero as the applied force increases from the critical value for incipient motion. We carried out experiments of fall of a sphere in a typical, thixotropic, pasty material (a laponite suspension). We either left a sphere falling in the fluid in different initial states of structure or vibrated the fluid in a given state of structure at different frequencies. In each case three analogous regimes appear either for increasing restructuring states of the fluid or decreasing frequencies: A rapid fall at an almost constant rate; a slower fall at a progressively decreasing velocity; a slow fall at a rapidly decreasing rate finally leading to apparent stoppage. These results show that the motion of an object, due to gravity in a pasty material, is a more complex dynamical process than generally assumed for simple yield stress fluids. A simple model using the basic features of the (thixotropic) rheological behavior of these pasty materials makes it possible to explain these experimental trends. The fall of an object in such a fluid thus appears to basically follow a bifurcation process: For a sufficiently large force applied onto the object its rapid motion tends to sufficiently liquify the fluid around it so that its subsequent motion is more rapid and so on until reaching a constant velocity; on the contrary if the force applied onto the object is not sufficiently large the fluid around has enough time to restructure, which slows down the motion and so on until the complete stoppage of the object.

International audience; Synopsis We present a new technique for reconstructing the instantaneous velocity profiles during creep, dynamic, or ramp tests under controlled stress in wide-gap Couette flows, from a series of similar tests under smaller stress amplitudes. This approach is based on a rigourous theory, and since it requires that the fluid does not flow close to the outer cylinder, it is particularly suitable for yield stress fluids. The interest of this reconstruction technique is that it is simpler than direct techniques nuclear magnetic resonance, light scattering, particle imaging velocimetry, etc. and has almost no limitations in time and space resolution. Thus, one can obtain the velocity profiles under steady-state and transient flows. We show that for a commercial hair gel the velocity profile obtained with this technique is in excellent agreement with that found from magnetic resonance imaging rheometry within the range of measurement four decades of velocity. From other tests with a mustard and a kaolin-water suspension we demonstrate that the ''viscosity bifurcation'' effect observed with various pasty materials Coussot et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 2002a is directly associated with an abrupt change in the slope of the velocity profiles at the interface between the sheared and unsheared regions. We also show that the effect of wall slip on the reconstructed velocity profile is to shift the level of the unsheared region to a virtual, constant, finite, velocity level.

International audience; The macroscopic response of a cracked solid subjected to drying is investigated within the framework of micromechanics. The originality of this contribution lies in the fact that the variations of the aspect ratios of cracks induced by the capillary pressure increase are accounted for. When the initial aspect ratio is small enough, it is shown that neglecting the geometrical changes yields an erroneous prediction of the sign of the macroscopic volume strain rate.; Le comportement d'un milieu poreux non saturé dont la phase solide est constituée d'un matériau élastique linéaire et dont l'espace poreux est constitué de fissures interconnectées entre elles est étudié par une méthode d'homogénéisation. L'originalité de l'approche réside dans la prise en compte des non linéarités géométriques dues aux déformations des fissures lors d'une variation de la saturation. Lorsque le rapport d'aspect des fissures est suffisamment petit, la prise en compte de cette non linéarité entraine une inversion du signe du taux de déformations volumiques de séchage prédit par rapport à une approche où ce couplage est négligé.