Viscoelastic deformation processes behavior

Unlike elastic deformation in which the atoms maintain their nearest neighbors, flow involves changes in nearest neighbors and is a process of shear. This process is also dependent on time, so that one is concerned with the change of strain with time. The ease of flow in a liquid is characterized by its viscosity. Viscous flow is usually associated with liquids but it can occur in amorphous solids. For such materials, elastic and viscous processes can coexist. This is termed viscoelasticity and one can view elastic and viscous deformation as the limiting conditions of such behavior. Flow processes, such as creep, can also occur in crystalline materials. In this situation, the deformation processes involve different mechanisms but they can mimic viscoelastic behavior. 

The combinahon of high molecular weight and high concentration leads to a very dramahc increase in the viscosity of the soluhon. A theory elaborated by deGennes is presented in Sechon 7.7. In addihon, for rapid deformation processes, the concentrated soluhon displays viscoelastic behavior. One of the most challenging problems in polymer science is the full explanahon of the viscoelastic behavior of high-molecular-weight concentrated solutions. 

Viscoelastic polymers essentially dominate the multi-billion dollar adhesives market, therefore an understanding of their adhesion behavior is very important. Adhesion of these materials involves quite a few chemical and physical phenomena. As with elastic materials, the chemical interactions and affinities in the interface provide the fundamental link for transmission of stress between the contacting bodies. This intrinsic resistance to detachment is usually augmented several folds by dissipation processes available to the viscoelastic media. The dissipation processes can have either a thermodynamic origin such as recoiling of the stretched polymeric chains upon detachment, or a dynamic and rate-sensitive nature as in chain pull-out, chain disentanglement and deformation-related rheological losses in the bulk of materials and in the vicinity of interface. 

Most pigmented systems are considered viscoelastic. At low shear rates and slow deformation, these systems are largely viscous. As the rate of deformation or shear rate increases, however, the viscous response cannot keep up, and the elasticity of the material increases. There is a certain amount of emphasis on viscoelastic behavior in connection with pigment dispersion as well as ink transportation and transformation processes in high-speed printing machines (see below). Under periodic strain, a viscoelastic material will behave as an elastic solid if the time scale of the experiment approaches the time required for the system to respond, i.e., the relaxation time. Elastic response can be visualized as a failure of the material to flow quickly enough to keep up with extremely short and fast stress/strain periods. 

Despite the similarities in brittle and ductile behavior to ceramics and metals, respectively, the elastic and permanent deformation mechanisms in polymers are quite different, owing to the difference in structure and size scale of the entities undergoing movement. Whereas plastic deformation (or lack thereof) could be described in terms of dislocations and slip planes in metals and ceramics, the polymer chains that must be deformed are of a much larger size scale. Before discussing polymer mechanical properties in this context, however, we must first describe a phenomenon that is somewhat unique to polymers—one that imparts some astounding properties to these materials. That property is viscoelasticity, and it can be described in terms of fundamental processes that we have already introduced. 

There are several important things to note. The first is that elastic deformation is a reversible process, but plastic deformation and brittle fracture are not. More importantly, plastic deformation and viscoelastic behavior are kinetic phenomena time is important, and they can be affected by press speed. In reality, most materials exhibit both plastic and brittle behavior, but specific materials can be classified as primarily plastic or primarily brittle. For example, microcrystalUne cellulose defonns primarily by a plastic deformation mechanism calcium phosphate de-fonns primarily by a brittle fracture mechanism lactose is in the middle [8]. 

Measurement of linear viscolelastic properties is a useful way of gaining information about a food s micro structure and how this influences the food s rheological character (Narine and Marangoni, 1999 Gunsekaran and Ak, 2002). However, many processing operations, and mastication, involve large, rapid deformations during which viscoelastic behavior is nonlinear. 

The deformation behavior of two pads are shown in Figure 4.14. Which pad shows greater elastic behavior Which pad shows viscoelastic behavior A CMP process is required to planarize a surface with a maximum step height of 5000 A. If the velocity of the pad is 50 cm/sec, which pad will polish faster inside a 5 pm wide trench A 10 pm wide trench A 15 pm wide trench What is the maximum width of a low region that may be planarized by each pad (Note assume that the pad relaxation and deformation behaviors (curves) are similar and symmetric.)... 

Studies on the mechanical properties of glassy polymer-solvent or, more generally, polymer-diluent mixtures have been primarily concerned with the deformation behavior at small strains which is governed by the viscoelastic properties of the material. From these studies it is well known that diluents significantly affect relaxation processes in glassy polymers, as clearly evidenced by phenomena such as plasticization and antiplasticization... 

In this book, we review the most basic distinctions and similarities among the rheological (or flow) properties of various complex fluids. We focus especially on their linear viscoelastic behavior, as measured by the frequency-dependent storage and loss moduli G and G" (see Section 1.3.1.4), and on the flow curve— that is, the relationship between the "shear viscosity q and the shear rate y. The storage and loss moduli reveal the mechanical properties of the material at rest, while the flow curve shows how the material changes in response to continuous deformation. A measurement of G and G" is often the most useful way of mechanically characterizing a complex material, while the flow curve q(y ) shows how readily the material can be processed, or shaped into a useful product. The... 

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