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Soft Matter and Biological Physics

Eur. Phys. J. E 2, 137-143

Equilibrium sedimentation profiles of charged colloidal suspensions

G. Téllez - T. Biben

Laboratoire de Physique (Unité Mixte de Recherche du Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - UMR 5672), Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, 69364 Lyon cedex 07, France
gtellez@faoa.uniandes.edu.co

Received 5 May 1999 and Received in final form 25 August 1999

Abstract
We investigate the sedimentation equilibrium of a charge-stabilized colloidal suspension in the regime of low ionic strength. We analyze the asymptotic behaviour of the density profiles on the basis of a simple Poisson-Boltzmann theory and show that the effective mass we can deduce from the barometric law corresponds to the actual mass of the colloidal particles, contrary to previous studies.

PACS
82.70.Dd Colloids - 05.20.Jj Statistical mechanics of classical fluids - 61.20.Gy Theory and models of liquid structure

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