Free-Energy Approaches for Pickering Emulsions: Particle Exchange between Colloid-Stabilized Droplets

Statistical Physics and Complexity Group meeting

Free-Energy Approaches for Pickering Emulsions: Particle Exchange between Colloid-Stabilized Droplets

  • Event time: 11:30am until 12:30pm
  • Event date: 14th December 2016
  • Speaker: Joost de Graaf (Formerly School of Physics & Astronomy, University of Edinburgh)
  • Location: Room 2511,

Event details

In this presentation we introduce the concept of the "Pieranski potential", which is the free-energy for interfacial absorption of colloidal particles to a liquid-liquid (or liquid-gas) interface. We show how this reduces the problem of computing the equilibrium interfacial absorption configuration of a particle to a geometric problem in the case that interfacial curvature can be ignored. Specifically, we theoretically consider using simple physical arguments the possible cause for exchange of particles between two Pickering droplets, which was recently experimentally observed to occur [D. French et al., Scientific Reports 6, 31401 (2016)]. Finally, we discuss the open problems with regards to this so-called "secret life of Pickering emulsions" and how to best proceed in tackling them.