Abstract
The Synchronized Molecular-Dynamics simulation, which was recently proposed by authors [Phys. Rev. X 4, 041011 (2014)], is applied to the analysis of polymer lubrication between parallel plates. The changes in rheological properties, conformational change of polymer chains, and temperature rise due to the viscous heating are investigated with varying values of thermal conductivity of the polymeric liquid. It is found that with a small applied shear stress on the plate, the temperature of the polymeric liquid only slightly increases in inverse proportion to the thermal conductivity; the apparent viscosity of the polymeric liquid is little affected by changing the thermal conductivity. However, at a large shear stress the transitional behaviors of the polymeric liquid are observed due to the interplay of the shear deformation and viscous heating by changing the thermal conductivity. It is found that this transition is characterized by the Nahme-Griffith number, defined as the ratio of the viscous heating to the thermal conduction.
