Theories of Binary Fluid Mixtures: From Phase-Separation Kinetics to Active Emulsions

Abstract

Binary fluid mixtures are examples of complex fluids whose microstructure and flow are strongly coupled. For pairs of simple fluids, the microstructure consists of droplets or bicontinuous demixed domains and the physics is controlled by the interfaces between these domains. At continuum level, the structure is defined by a composition field whose gradients which are steep near interfaces drive its diffusive current. These gradients also cause thermodynamic stresses which can drive fluid flow. Fluid flow in turn advects the composition field, while thermal noise creates additional random fluxes that allow the system to explore its configuration space and move towards the Boltzmann distribution. This article introduces continuum models of binary fluids, first covering some well-studied areas such as the thermodynamics and kinetics of phase separation, and emulsion stability. We then address cases where one of the fluid components has anisotropic structure at mesoscopic scales creating nematic (or polar) liquid-crystalline order; this can be described through an additional tensor (or vector) order parameter field. We conclude by outlining a thriving area of current research, namely active emulsions, in which one of the binary components consists of living or synthetic material that is continuously converting chemical energy into mechanical work.

arXiv comment55 pages, 14 figures

References in corpus (33)

• Theory of Phase Ordering Kinetics
• Motility-Induced Phase Separation
• Spontaneous motion in hierarchically assembled active matter
• Dynamical clustering and phase separation in suspensions of self-propelled colloidal particles
• How far from equilibrium is active matter?
• Topological Defects and Interactions in Nematic Emulsions
• Rheology of Active-Particle Suspensions
• Colloidal Jamming at Interfaces: a Route to Fluid-bicontinuous Gels
• Generic theory of active polar gels: a paradigm for cytoskeletal dynamics
• Pressure is not a state function for generic active fluids
• Bicontinuous emulsions stabilized solely by colloidal particles
• A continuum theory of phase separation kinetics for active Brownian particles
• Scalar ${\varphi }^4$ field theory for active-particle phase separation
• Defect annihilation and proliferation in active nematics
• Inertial effects in three dimensional spinodal decomposition of a symmetric binary fluid mixture: A lattice Boltzmann study
• Clusters, asters and collective oscillations in chemotactic colloids
• Controlled interfacial assembly of 2D curved colloidal crystals and jammed shells
• Spontaneous symmetry breaking in active droplets provides a generic route to motility
• Spontaneous contractility--mediated cortical flow generates cell migration in 3-dimensional environments
• Light-induced self-assembly of active rectification devices
• A minimal physical model captures the shapes of crawling cells
• Active Model H: Scalar Active Matter in a Momentum-Conserving Fluid
• A novel coarsening mechanism of droplets in immiscible fluid mixtures
• Colloidal gels assembled via a temporary interfacial scaffold
• Hydrodynamics of polar liquid crystals
• Nonequilibrium steady states in sheared binary fluids
• Active Viscoelastic Matter: from Bacterial Drag Reduction to Turbulent Solids
• Phase ordering of two-dimensional symmetric binary fluids: a droplet scaling state
• Binary fluids under steady shear in three dimensions
• Defect driven shapes in nematic droplets: analogies with cell division
• Cytoplasmic streaming in plant cells: the role of wall slip
• The need for inertia in nonequilibrium steady states of sheared binary fluids
• Shear dynamics of an inverted nematic emulsion

Cited by in corpus (76)

• Physical Models of Collective Cell Migration
• Physics of Active Emulsions
• Cluster phases and bubbly phase separation in active fluids: Reversal of the Ostwald process
• Phase-space geometry of mass-conserving reaction-diffusion dynamics
• Critical motility-induced phase separation belongs to the Ising universality class
• Capillary interfacial tension in active phase separation
• Onsager's variational principle in active soft matter
• Directional self-locomotion of active droplets enabled by nematic environment
• A review of active matter reviews
• Non-equilibrium phase separation with reactions: A canonical model and its behaviour
• From bulk to microphase separation in scalar active matter: A perturbative renormalization group analysis
• Extensile to contractile transition in active microtubule-actin composites generates layered asters with programmable lifetimes
• Hydrodynamically interrupted droplet growth in scalar active matter
• Periodic bouncing of a plasmonic bubble in a binary liquid by competing solutal and thermal Marangoni forces
• Active phase separation: new phenomenology from non-equilibrium physics
• Simulating the chromatin mediated phase separation of model proteins with multiple domains
• Predictive local field theory for interacting active Brownian spheres in two spatial dimensions
• Activity-suppressed phase separation
• Collective dynamics of active Brownian particles in three spatial dimensions: a predictive field theory
• Stochastic Hydrodynamics of Complex Fluids: Discretisation and Entropy Production
• Novel physics arising from phase transitions in biology
• Shear-induced first-order transition in polar liquid crystals
• Odd Cosserat elasticity in active materials
• Polymer compaction and bridging-induced clustering of protein-inspired patchy particles
• Fingering Instability of Active Nematic Droplets
• Intercellular Friction and Motility Drive Orientational Order in Cell Monolayers
• Kinetic energy spectra and flux in turbulent phase-separating symmetric binary-fluid mixtures
• Yield-stress transition in suspensions of deformable droplets
• Rheology of active polar emulsions: from linear to unidirectional and unviscid flow, and intermittent viscosity
• Active fluids at circular boundaries: Swim pressure and anomalous droplet ripening
• Variational methods and deep Ritz method for active elastic solids
• Motility induced phase separation of deformable cells
• Hyperuniformity in phase ordering: the roles of activity, noise, and non-constant mobility
• Analysis of a viscoelastic phase separation model
• Self-organized structures of two-component laser fields and their active controls in a cold Rydberg atomic gas
• Enhanced stability and chaotic condensates in multi-species non-reciprocal mixtures
• Derivation and analysis of a phase field crystal model for a mixture of active and passive particles
• Traveling waves at the surface of active liquid crystals
• Diffusive evaporation dynamics in polymer solutions is ubiquitous
• Self-propulsion of active droplets without liquid-crystalline order
• The near and far of a pair of magnetic capillary disks
• Multiphase Field Model of Cells on a Substrate: From 3D to 2D
• Inertia drives concentration-wave turbulence in swimmer suspensions
• Active XY model on a substrate: Density fluctuations and phase ordering
• Defect turbulence in a dense suspension of polar, active swimmers
• Effective interactions mediated between two permeable disks in an active fluid
• Interface dynamics of wet active systems
• Active Segregation Dynamics in the Living Cell
• Fluctuating kinetic theory and fluctuating hydrodynamics of aligning active particles: the dilute limit
• Active quantum flocks
• Active-gel Theory for Multicellular Migration of Polar Cells in the Extra-cellular Matrix
• Chemical reaction motifs driving non-equilibrium behaviors in phase separating materials
• Active fluids form system-spanning filamentary networks
• Physicochemical Hydrodynamics of Droplets out of Equilibrium: A Perspective Review
• Self-organisation of Protein Patterns
• Shearing effects on the phase coarsening of binary mixtures using the Active Model B
• Navigating the Complex Landscape of Shock Filter Cahn-Hilliard Equation: From Regularized to Entropy Solutions
• Phase Separation in Mixtures of Nematic and Isotropic Fluids
• A simple, fully-discrete, unconditionally energy-stable method for the two-phase Navier-Stokes Cahn-Hilliard model with arbitrary density ratios
• Statistics and morphologies of stable droplets in scalar active fluids
• Coarsening of binary Bose superfluids: an effective theory
• Onset of thermo-convective instabilities in two-layer binary fluid systems
• Banana and pizza-slice-shaped mesogens give a new constrained ferromagnet universality class
• Non-equilibrium structure and relaxation in active microemulsions
• Kinetic theory of coupled binary-fluid-surfactant systems
• Active osmotic-like pressure on permeable inclusions
• Dynamics Phases, Stratification, Laning, and Pattern Formation for Driven Bidisperse Disk Systems in the Presence of Quenched Disorder
• Active Cahn-Hilliard theory for nonequilibrium phase separation: quantitative macroscopic predictions and a microscopic derivation
• The stress tensor of dilute active colloidal suspensions
• Robust microphase separation through chemical reaction networks
• Coagulation drives turbulence in binary fluid mixtures
• Method of regularised stokeslets: Flow analysis and improvement of convergence
• The non-equilibrium thermodynamics of active suspensions
• Externally driven condensates show translation-induced polarization, directed coalescence, and anomalous diffusion in viscoelastic media
• Instabilities and turbulence in extensile swimmer suspensions
• Fluid flow and spatiotemporal chaos in chemically active emulsions