Anisotropy of magnetic emulsions induced by magnetic and electric fields

Phys Rev E Stat Nonlin Soft Matter Phys. 2011 Sep;84(3 Pt 1):031402. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevE.84.031402. Epub 2011 Sep 7.

Abstract

The anisotropy of magnetic emulsions induced by simultaneously acting electric and magnetic fields is theoretically and experimentally investigated. Due to the anisotropy, the electric conductivity and magnetic permeability of a magnetic emulsion are no longer scalar coefficients, but are tensors. The electric conductivity and magnetic permeability tensors of sufficiently diluted emulsions in sufficiently weak electric and magnetic fields are found as functions of the electric and magnetic intensity vectors. The theoretically predicted induced anisotropy was verified experimentally. The experimental data are fitted in order to calculate the dimensions of the ellipsoidal drops of the emulsion distorted by the electric and magnetic fields. The dependence of the calculated fitting parameter on the intensity of the magnetic field is compared with the theoretical one. The results of the analysis of the experimental data are discussed.