Particle shapes leading to Newtonian dilute suspensions

Abstract

It is well known that suspensions of particles in a viscous fluid can affect the rheology significantly, producing a pronounced non-Newtonian response even in dilute suspension. However, it is unclear a priori which particle shapes lead to this behaviour. We present two simple symmetry conditions on the shape which are sufficient for a dilute suspension to be Newtonian for all strain sizes and one sufficient for Newtonian behavior for small strains. We also construct a class of shapes out of thin, rigid rods not found by the symmetry argument which share this property for small strains.