Zero applied stress rheometer

Abstract : In order to test the fluctuation-dissipation relation on rheological properties of soft materials, we built an experiment to measure thermally excited strain in a sample and compare it to the classical response to an external stress. The rheometer is based on a cylindrical Couette geometry. We use differential interferometry to achieve better than 10(-10) rad/rootHz sensitivity in angular position above 0.5 Hz. The forcing method, based on electrostatic interaction in a capacitor, generates torques comparable to that of thermal noise. Experiments on a calibrated silicon oil show good agreement between response and fluctuation measurements.