Hydrodynamic effects in polymer solutions. I. Friction coefficients in steady elongational flow

Abstract

The hydrodynamic drag on the spherical beads of a dilute suspension of multibead–spring–rod chains immersed in a Newtonian solvent in steady elongational flow is calculated with the method of induced forces. Hydrodynamic interactions between the beads cause the drag to be anisotropic in space while the friction tensors exhibit a nonanalytic dependence on the velocity gradient when nonlinear terms in the quasistatic Navier–Stokes equation are considered. A discussion of the differences with the phenomenological form usually adopted in polymer dynamics is given and potential applications of the results in rheology are highlighted.