SHEAR-INDUCED PHASE TRANSITION OF LIVING POLYMERS (MICELLES)

We study the shear-induced formation of a supermolecular structure in dilute rodlike micellar solutions. The effect of shear flow on the micellar self-assembly is described by invoking the decoupling of fluid motion from thermodynamic aggregation. In contrast to the case involving an extensional potential flow, we find that for a given concentration of surfactant molecules there is a critical shear rate beyond which a gellike supermolecular structure appears in the shear flow, in confirmation of experimental observations by Hoffmann and Rehage