Forças de depleção exercidas por matéria ativa e passiva em colóides passivos

Abstract

In this thesis it is proposed a study of the influence of the depletion forces induced by passive particles as a function of the medium (particles) that surrounds then. In the first part of this thesis, the depletion forces exerted by active (self-propelled) particles on passive and elliptical passive objects are studied through numerical simulations. It is shown that a bath of active particles can induce repulsive and attractive forces that are sensitive to the shape and orientation of the passive objects. In general, the force resulting in passive objects due to the active particles is studied as a function of the shape and orientation of the passive objects, magnitude of the angular noise, and distance between passive objects. In the case where the separation between passive objects is less than an active particle diameter, the increase of this separation results in an increase of the magnitude of the depletion forces, which are repulsive in this case. For distances between passive objects larger than one diameter of the active particle, the magnitude of the depletion force always decreases with increasing distance between the passive particles. It is also observed that the nature of the depletion force (attractive or repulsive) depends on the shape and relative orientation of the passive particles. It is noted that an attractive depletion force occurs when elliptical passive objects are arranged side by side, but so that the semi-major axis are parallel and not aligned. This occurs for a sufficiently high concentration (or density) of active particles. In the second part of the thesis, we study the dependence of the depletion force related to the shape of the objects that undergo such interactions. In this case, passive "large" objects (elliptic, triangular and semi-circular forms), which undergo the depletion interaction, are immersed in a passive solvent (bath of passive particles of smaller size). The depletion forces may present distinct nature (attractive or repulsive) from that predicted by Asakura-Oosawa. The passive bath always attractive or repulsive depletion forces depending on the shape of the passive objects. In addition, the intensity of the depletion forces are sensitive to the shape of the obstacle and the bath temperature of passive particles, as well as to the size of the passive objects suffering the depletion interaction and density of the bath particles. By modifying the shape of the passive objects from elliptical to triangular, the magnitude of the repulsive depletion forces increases by two orders of magnitude. In the case of semi-circular objects, a strong damped oscillation is observed in the depletion force, emphasizing that such forces are considerably sensitive to the distance between the passive objects. In the case of triangular objects, it is observed that the induced depletion forces can be attractive or repulsive depending on the internal angle, which becomes a parameter of control of the resulting depletion force.