Overview

Complex fluids like polymer solutions, melts etc. are characterized by relaxation motions at widely varying length and time scales, ranging over several orders of magnitudes. My research aims at a multi-scale analysis of the dynamics occurring at different length scales and their interplay with any imposed flow on the system. For this, I employ computational techniques like molecular dynamics (which provides information at the level of atoms and molecules) and Brownian dynamics ("Mesoscale" simulations that probe the behavior of groups of atoms, molecules). Using the fundamental information obtained from such simulations, we can, in principle, try to build constitutive models for such systems, which can be used with CFD to understand the non-newtonian effects produced by these complex fluids in flow.

Recent Publications

  • Indranil Saha Dalal, Chih-Chen Hsieh, Alex Albaugh and Ronald G. Larson,"Effects of Excluded Volume and Hydrodynamic Interactions on the Behavior of Isolated Bead-Rod Polymer Chains in Shearing Flow", AIChE J., 60 (4), 1400-1412 (2014).
  • Indranil Saha Dalal and Ronald G. Larson, "Explaining the Absence of High-Frequency Viscoelastic Relaxation Modes of Polymers in Dilute Solutions", Macromolecules, 46 (5), 1981-1992 (2013).
  • Indranil Saha Dalal, Alex Albaugh, Nazish Hoda and Ronald G. Larson, "Tumbling and deformation of isolated polymer chains in shearing flow", Macromolecules, 45 (23), 9493-9499 (2012).
  • Indranil Saha Dalal, Nazish Hoda and Ronald G. Larson, "Multiple Regimes of Deformation in Shearing Flow of Isolated Polymers ", Journal of Rheology, 56, 305 (2009).