  Dense suspensions of hard particles in a liquid can exhibit strikingly
counter-intuitive behavior, such as discontinuous shear thickening (DST) [1-8]
and reversible shear jamming (SJ) into a state with finite yield stress [9-13].
Recent studies identified a stress-activated crossover from hydrodynamic
interactions to frictional particle contacts to be key for these behaviors
[2-4, 6-8, 10, 14]. However, many suspensions exhibit only DST and not SJ. Here
we show that particle surface chemistry can play a central role in creating
conditions that allow for SJ. We find the system's ability to form
interparticle hydrogen bonds when sheared into contact elicits SJ. We
demonstrate this with charge-stabilized polymer microspheres and non-spherical
cornstarch particles, controlling hydrogen bond formation with solvents. The
propensity for SJ is quantified by tensile tests [13] and linked to an enhanced
friction by atomic force microscopy. Our results extend the fundamental
understanding of the SJ mechanism and open new avenues for designing strongly
non-Newtonian fluids.
