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Updated: Jul 12, 2026

Confocal Imaging of Confined Quiescent and Flowing Colloid-polymer Mixtures
Published on: May 21, 2014
Sol-Gel transition of concentrated colloidal suspensions
Romer1, Scheffold, Schurtenberger
1University of Fribourg, CH-1700 Fribourg, Switzerland and Polymer Institute, ETH Zurich, CH-8092 Zurich, Switzerland.
Abstract:
Diffusing-wave spectroscopy (DWS) was used to follow the sol-gel transition of concentrated colloidal suspensions. We present a new technique based on a sandwich of two scattering cells aimed to overcome the problem of nonergodicity in DWS of solidlike systems. Using this technique we obtain quantitative information about the microscopic dynamics all the way from an aggregating suspension to the final gel, thereby covering the whole sol-gel transition. At the gel point a dramatic change of the particle dynamics from diffusion to a subdiffusive arrested motion is observed. A critical-power-law behavior is found for the time evolution of the maximum mean square displacement delta(2) probed by a single particle in the gel.
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