Nonmagnetic particles immersed in magnetic fluids offer interesting opportunities in separations, assemblies and other applications. These materials develop anisotropies in properties such as dielectric permittivity, viscosities and refractive indices in the presence of magnetic field. We have developed computational and simulation tools to assist in the in-depth understanding of the thermodynamic properties of such nonmagnetic nanoparticles immersed in magnetic fluids under varying magnetic field conditions.

A fundamental understanding of these properties, such as chemical potential, is important in the development of magnetic separation systems. In previous works, the magnetic fluid has been considered as a continuum; however, when dealing with smaller particles (especially biological entities), this approximation breaks down. Theoretical analysis of such a complex system is difficult using conventional theories, and hence we have used Monte Carlo simulations to explore these effects. We have developed a novel method to evaluate the chemical potential of the nonmagnetic particles with the variation in magnetic field strength. We have studied the effect of magnetic field strength, nonmagnetic particle size and magnetic particle size on the chemical potential driving forces.