Modelling of Curved Rods in Dense Suspensions goes Full Circle

Dense suspensions are a broad class of out-of-equilibrium systems that often display interesting macroscopic behaviour under flow. The rich physics observed for suspensions of spheres can be expanded to particles of more complex geometries, resulting in novel flow phenomena. Real-world compositions that diversify beyond uniaxial rods are ubiquitous in nature and engineering processes. This work applies concepts from dry granular physics to model the rheology of suspensions of curved rods. Specifically, we investigate the interplay between rod curvature (exploring an angular range of 0-2π) and packing efficiency. In our sheared suspensions, the stress response provides insight into the emergent force networks and is used to identify the shape-dependent jamming transition. Notably, the jamming volume fraction is a non-monotonic function of curvature, which we believe to be a consequence of arising orientational order attributed to the different packing abilities of rods, arches and disks.