Confinement and geometric complexity can fundamentally alter the flow of complex fluids. As these materials move around obstacles, through narrow passages, or across regions of strong extension, their microstructure deforms and reorganizes, producing changes in flow resistance, symmetry breaking, and instabilities that are absent or much weaker in simple fluids. We combine modeling, simulations, and experiments to determine how material rheology, geometry, and flow kinematics interact. Beyond advancing the fundamental understanding of complex-fluid transport, this knowledge can help address practical challenges in applications such as subsurface remediation and enhanced oil recovery.
Related projects: viscoelastic flows around isolated obstacles and arrays of obstacles; transport through constrictions, expansions, and porous structures; and elastic instabilities in extensional and stagnation-point flows.
