Steady-state particle distribution of a dilute sedimenting suspension

Abstract

\n \nThe stationary state of a non-Brownian dilute sedimenting suspension of hard particles is studied.\nThe configurational distribution of these particles is the main subject of interest.\nA hierarchy of equations for the correlation functions, analogous to the BBGKY hierarchy \nknown from kinetic theory, is derived. Next, assuming integrability of the correlations, \nit is shown that in the low-concentration limit the hierarchy can be truncated leading to an effective \nequation for the two-particle correlation function. This function has been explicitly calculated, \nand used to compute the sedimentation coefficient λ. The obtained result is $\\lambda=-3.87$ which agrees \nperfectly with the experiment.\n\n