A lubrication equation for a simplified model of shear-thinning fluid

Abstract

A lubrication equation is obtained for a simplified shear-thinning fluid. The simplified rheology consists of a piecewise linear stress tensor, resulting in a two-viscosity model. This can be interpreted as a modified Bingham fluid, which can be recovered in a specific limit. The lubrication equation is obtained in two steps. First two scalings are performed on the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations, namely the long-wave scaling and the slow motion scaling. Second, the resulting equations are averaged along the vertical direction. Numerical illustrations are provided, bringing to light the different possible behaviours.