The stability of a colloidal suspension plays an important role in colloidal processing of materials. The stability of the colloidal fluid phase is especially vital in achieving high green densities. By colloidal fluid phase, we refer to a phase in which colloidal particles are well separated and free to move about by Brownian motion, By controlling parameters such as pH, salt concentration, and surfactants, one can achieve high packing (green) densities in the repulsive regime where the suspension is well dispersed as a colloidal fluid, and low green densities in the attractive regime where the suspensions are flocculated [1,2]. While there is increasing interest in using bimodal suspensions to improve green densities, neither the stability of a binary suspension as a colloidal fluid nor the stability effects on the green densities have been studied in depth as yet. Traditionally, the effect of using bimodal-particle-size distribution has only been considered in terms of geometrical packing developed by Furnas and others [3,4]. This model is a simple packing concept and is used and useful for hard sphere-like repulsive interparticle interactions. With the advances in powder technology, smaller and smaller particles are available for ceramic processing. Thus, the traditional consideration of geometrial packing for the green densities of bimodal suspensions may not be enough. The interaction between particles must be taken into account.
Self-assembly mechanism in colloids: perspectives from statistical physics
