Formation and collapse of gels of sterically stabilized colloidal particles

Colloidal silica spheres (diameter 88 nm) with a thick steric stabilization layer of polystyrene (PS; M_w = 26 600 g mol^-1) were prepared. In cyclohexane, a marginal solvent for PS, particle aggregation and gelation were observed on lowering the temperature. Near the gelation temperature and at particle concentrations of a few per cent by weight, the gels were sufficiently weak to slowly compact under gravity. On quenching to slightly lower temperatures, the gels still settled, but the top of the sediment did not become flat, as is usually the case. This seems to be related to an unusual mechanism for gel compaction, which starts by forming a more dense structure at the top of the sample. It is proposed that this is related to the entangled polymer chains on neighbouring particles resisting substantial rearrangement of the local structure. The transient gelation phenomenon, observed previously for mixtures of colloid and non-adsorbing polymer, has so far not been observed for our system.