Lennard-Jones fluid-fluid interfaces under shear

Using nonequilibrium molecular dynamics simulations on simple Lennard-Jones binary mixtures, we have studied the behavior of planar fluid-fluid interfaces undergoing shear flow. When the miscibility is low enough, a slip together with a partial depletion have been noticed at the interface between the two fluid phases. The slip length can reach a value equal to some molecular diameters and the corresponding interfacial viscosity can be two times smaller than the value in the bulk. It is shown how the omission of this slip may lead to flow-rate misevaluation when dealing with a multiphase flow in a nanoporous medium even for non polymer fluids. In addition, using the simulation results, a simple relation between interfacial tension and interfacial viscosity is proposed for the monoatomic systems studied in this work. Finally, it is shown that the interfacial viscosity cannot be fully accounted for by estimating the local viscosity deduced from the local thermodynamic properties of the interface.