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Sedimentation of a suspension of paramagnetic particles in an external magnetic field
Jérémy Vessaire1, Nicolas Plihon1, Romain Volk1
1Univ Lyon, ENS de Lyon, Univ Claude Bernard Lyon 1, CNRS, Laboratoire de Physique, F-69342 Lyon, France.
Abstract:
We investigate the sedimentation of initially packed paramagnetic particles in the presence of a homogeneous external magnetic field, in a Hele-Shaw cell filled with water. Although the magnetic susceptibility of the particles is small and the particle-particle-induced magnetic interactions are significantly smaller compared to the gravitational acceleration, we do observe a measurable reduction of the decompaction rate as the amplitude of the applied magnetic field is increased. While induced magnetic dipole-dipole interactions between particles can be either attractive or repulsive depending on the particles relative alignment, our observations reveal an effective overall enhancement of the cohesion of the initial pack of particles due to the induced interactions, very likely promoting internal chain forces in the initial pack of particles. The influence of the magnetic field on the particles once they disperse after being decompacted is, however, found to remain marginal.
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