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Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/2289/8682
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dc.contributor.authorParmar, Vaibhav Raj Singh-
dc.contributor.authorBandyopadhyay, Ranjini-
dc.date.accessioned2026-02-27T11:27:41Z-
dc.date.available2026-02-27T11:27:41Z-
dc.date.issued2025-12-23-
dc.identifier.citationNew Journal of Physics, 2025, Vol. 27 (12), AR No. 124402en_US
dc.identifier.issn1367-2630-
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2289/8682-
dc.descriptionOpen Access.en_US
dc.description.abstractWhen a less viscous Newtonian fluid displaces an aging aqueous clay suspension in a confined space, a rich array of interfacial patterns emerges due to a predominantly viscous instability. Earlier studies on clay displacement identified macroscopic morphologies such as fingering and fracturing, but the local finger propagation modes did not receive much attention. For the present work, we controlled the mechanical properties of clay suspensions by incorporating additives and observed a range of local finger propagation modes when the suspensions were radially displaced by water in a Hele–Shaw cell. When the elasticity of clay was low, the interfacial dynamics exhibited features of nonlinear viscous fingering in heterogeneous media. By tuning the nature and content of additives that delay clay aging, we uncovered two novel finger propagation mechanisms: skewering and zig–zag growth, both characterised by tortuous trajectories and thick finger profiles. These patterns have hitherto never been observed in experiments with colloidal systems. For moderate clay elasticities, we report that shear-thinning-induced flow anisotropy leads to the formation of dendrites with dominant side branches. As clay elasticity increases due to the incorporation of salts, the energy required to create fractures becomes smaller than that for system-wide yielding. This scenario is characterised by the emergence of viscoelastic fractures. Our work demonstrates that incorporating additives in the suspension medium significantly modifies clay elasticity and permeability and is an effective strategy to manipulate the growth and morphologies of instabilities at clay-water interfaces.en_US
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherNew Journal of Physicsen_US
dc.relation.urihttps://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/arXiv:2509.02335en_US
dc.relation.urihttp://doi.org/10.1088/1367-2630/ae27ecen_US
dc.relation.urihttps://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2509.02335en_US
dc.rights2025 The Authorsen_US
dc.subjectviscous fingering instabilityen_US
dc.subjectclayen_US
dc.subjectinterfacial patternsen_US
dc.subjectskeweringen_US
dc.subjectzig–zag propagationen_US
dc.titlePermeability heterogeneity and bulk linear elasticity of displaced clay suspensions determine interfacial pattern morphologies in Hele–Shaw experimentsen_US
dc.typeArticleen_US
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