How to Expand Your High-Performance Rheometer Capabilities for Powder Characterisation

Summary

Research rheometers present excellent platforms for the characterisation and quantification of powder flowability. Until recent years, powder characterisations have been restricted only to instruments dedicated to just that one class of materials. Now there is a growing recognition of the opportunities for extending the application of high-performance rheometers to the measurement of particulate solids.

In this webinar, we will demonstrate how, with the addition of some newly available accessories, we have extended the working range of one of our TA Instruments Discovery HR10 rheometers, opening up their operating range from the characterisation of liquids and semisolids into profiling powders and granular materials. This expands their range of potential applications for measuring products from pharmaceutical actives and excipients to proteins and food supplements, 3D printing materials, graphite and carbon black.

We start the webinar demonstrating the use of established shear cell methods to obtain cohesion, internal friction and flow function data, enabling the user to compare their materials against accepted flowability categorisations. We then move on to show more recently introduced dynamic flow-cell methods. Flow-cells can exploit the torque sensitivity that is unique to high performance research rheometer platforms, delivering potentially valuable advantages for the measurement of powders in low-stress situations and enabling simple, quantified assessments of caking, crusting and agglomeration.

The Centre for Industrial Rheology

The Centre for Industrial Rheology is a specialist physical characterisation laboratory located in the south of the UK, delivering expert materials analysis services to the world’s leading corporations. Having its foundations in liquid and semi-solid rheology, the Centre has expanded to provide powder rheology, interfacial measurements, foam analysis and thermal properties insights to innovators spanning industries including pharmaceuticals, electronics and batteries, inks, paints & coatings, and food & beverages.

Speakers

Daniel Williams
Applications R&D Specialist
Centre for Industrial Rheology

Daniel joined the Centre in 2022 with a chemistry background, having completed his MChem at the University of Southampton. He works as part of the laboratory team as an Applications R&D Specialist and writes case studies and seeks new applications for instruments in the lab. Most recently he has pioneered the Centre’s foray into foam rheology and has been exploring the field of rheo-microscopy using the MMA by TA Instruments.