Forces Acting on Sessile Droplet on Inclined Surfaces

Author(s):  
S. Ravi Annapragada ◽  
Jayathi Y. Murthy ◽  
Suresh V. Garimella

Although many analytical, experimental and numerical studies have focused on droplet motion, the mechanics of the droplet while still in its static state, and just before motion starts, are not well understood. A study of static droplets would shed light on the threshold voltage (or critical inclination) for initiating electrically (or gravitationally) induced droplet motion. Before the droplet starts to move, the droplet shape changes such that the forces acting at the triple contact line balance the actuation forces. These contact line forces are governed by the contact angles along the contact line. The contact angle varies from an advancing angle at the leading edge to a receding angle at the trailing edge of the droplet. The present study seeks to understand and predict these forces at the triple contact line. The droplet shape, as well as the advancing and receding contact angles, is experimentally measured as a function of droplet size under the action of a gravitational force at different inclination angles. The advancing and receding contact angles are correlated with static contact angle and Bond number. A Volume of Fluid - Continuous Surface Force model with varying contact angles along the triple contact line is developed to predict the same. The model is first verified against a two-dimensional analytical solution. It is then used to simulate the shape of a sessile droplet on an incline at various angles of inclination and to determine the critical angle of inclination as a function of droplet size. Good agreement is found between experimental measurements and predictions. The contact line profile and contact area are also predicted. The contact area predictions based on a spherical-cap assumption are also compared against the numerical predictions.

Author(s):  
Qi Ni ◽  
Timo Marschke ◽  
Samuel Steele ◽  
Najafi Seyed ◽  
Nathan B. Crane

A novel method of measuring contact line friction and contact angle hysteresis is described. In this method, a droplet is constrained between two surfaces while the surface of interest initiates motion. The results are compared to conventional characterization methods such as measuring the angle of inclined plane for droplet motion and measuring advancing and receding contact angles by infusing/withdrawing liquid from the substrate. At slow speeds, the proposed method provides a measure of the hysteresis but can also capture information about the contact line friction and viscous affects. Droplet force dependence on droplet size (height/width) is also investigated.


Author(s):  
Neeharika Anantharaju ◽  
Mahesh Panchagnula ◽  
Wayne Kimsey ◽  
Sudhakar Neti ◽  
Svetlana Tatic-Lucic

The wettability of silicon surface hydrophobized using silanization reagents was studied. The advancing and receding contact angles were measured with the captive needle approach. In this approach, a drop under study was held on the hydrophobized surface with a fine needle immersed in it. The asymptotic advancing and receding angles were obtained by incrementally increasing the volume added and removed, respectively, until no change in angles was observed. The values were compared with the previously published results. Further, the wetting behavior of water droplets on periodically structured hydrophobic surfaces was investigated. The surfaces were prepared with the wet etching process and contain posts and holes of different sizes and void fractions. The surface geometry brought up a scope to study the Wenzel (filling of surface grooves) and Cassie (non filling of the surface grooves) theories and effects of surface geometry and roughness on the contact angle. Experimental data point to an anomalous behavior where the data does not obey either Wenzel or Cassie type phenomenology. This behavior is explained by an understanding of the contact line topography. The effect of contact line topography on the contact angle was thus parametrically studied. It was also inferred that, the contact angle increased with the increase in void fraction. The observations may serve as guidelines in designing surfaces with the desired wetting behavior.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
H. Yildirim Erbil

The wetted area of a sessile droplet on a practical substrate is limited by the three-phase contact line and characterized by contact angle, contact radius and drop height. Although, contact angles of droplets have been studied for more than two hundred years, there are still some unanswered questions. In the last two decades, it was experimentally proven that the advancing and receding contact angles, and the contact angle hysteresis of rough and chemically heterogeneous surfaces, are determined by interactions of the liquid and the solid at the three-phase contact line alone, and the interfacial area within the contact perimeter is irrelevant. However, confusion and misunderstanding still exist in this field regarding the relationship between contact angle and surface roughness and chemical heterogeneity. An extensive review was published on the debate for the dependence of apparent contact angles on drop contact area or the three-phase contact line in 2014. Following this old review, several new articles were published on the same subject. This article presents a review of the novel articles (mostly published after 2014 to present) on the dependency of contact angles on the three-phase contact line, after a short summary is given for this long-lasting debate. Recently, some improvements have been made; for example, a relationship of the apparent contact angle with the properties of the three-phase line was obtained by replacing the solid–vapor interfacial tension term, γSV, with a string tension term containing the edge energy, γSLV, and curvature of the triple contact line, km, terms. In addition, a novel Gibbsian thermodynamics composite system was developed for a liquid drop resting on a heterogeneous multiphase and also on a homogeneous rough solid substrate at equilibrium conditions, and this approach led to the same conclusions given above. Moreover, some publications on the line energy concept along the three-phase contact line, and on the “modified” Cassie equations were also examined in this review.


1996 ◽  
Vol 464 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. D. Dussaud ◽  
M. Vignes-Adler

ABSTRACTWe have investigated n-octane droplets resting on the surface of sodium chloride solutions as a function of the salt concentration in a saturated, closed cell. For high salt concentration, the system approaches a wetting transition : the contact angles are very small (∼ 1°), the macroscopic droplet is unstable, and it breaks up spontaneously into microdroplets. The stable polydisperse population of microdroplets (5 μm < r < 250 μm) allowed us to analyze the dependence of the contact angle on droplet size. Because of the low contact angle values, accurate measurement ofcontact angles was obtained by interferometry. Moreover the accuracy of the classical method was significantly improved through the systematic use of three wavelengths. The relationship between the contact angle and the size droplet size indicated a positive line tension, τ, and the order of magnitude of τ was in good agreement with the theoretical prediction, τ, varies between (8.6 ± 0.9). 10−11 N and (1 ± 0.1).10−9 N and was dependent on the salt concentration. The positive sign of τ and its significant effect on droplet shape were related to the fact that the system was approaching the wetting transition.


Author(s):  
Gihun Son

Microdroplet impact and evaporation on a solid surface, which is an integral part of an inkjet printing process, is studied numerically by solving the equations governing the conservation of mass, momentum, energy and mass fraction in the liquid and gas phases. The deformed droplet shape is tracked by a sharp-interface level-set method which is modified to include the effects of evaporation at the liquid-gas interface and dynamic contact angle at the liquid-gas-solid interline. The numerical results show that the droplet impact and evaporation pattern depends significantly on the advancing and receding contact angles. Also, the effect of cavity sidewall on the droplet motion is investigated.


Author(s):  
S. Ravi Annapragada ◽  
Susmita Dash ◽  
Suresh V. Garimella ◽  
Jayathi Y. Murthy

The static shape of droplets under electrowetting actuation is well-understood. The steady-state shape of the droplet is obtained based on the balance of surface tension and electrowetting forces, and the change in apparent contact angle is well-characterized by the Young-Lippmann equation. However, the transient droplet shape behavior when a voltage is suddenly applied across a droplet has received less attention. Additional dynamic frictional forces are at play during this transient process. We present a model to predict this transient behavior of the droplet shape under electrowetting actuation. The droplet shape is modeled using the volume of fluid method. The electrowetting and dynamic frictional forces are included as an effective dynamic contact angle through a force balance at the contact line. The model is used to predict the transient behavior of water droplets on smooth hydrophobic surfaces under electrowetting actuation. The predictions of transient behavior of droplet shape and contact radius are in excellent agreement our experimental measurements. The internal fluid motion is explained and the droplet motion is shown to initiate from the contact line. An approximate mathematical model is also developed to understand the physics of the droplet motion and to describe the overall droplet motion and the contact line velocities.


2012 ◽  
Vol 134 (10) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gihun Son

Microdroplet impact and evaporation on a solid surface, which is an integral part of an inkjet printing process, is studied numerically by solving the equations governing the conservation of mass, momentum, energy, and mass fraction in the liquid and gas phases. The deformed droplet shape is tracked by a sharp-interface level-set method, which is extended to include the effects of evaporation at the liquid–gas interface and dynamic contact angle at the liquid–gas–solid interline. The numerical results show that the droplet impact and evaporation pattern depends significantly on the advancing and receding contact angles. Also, the effect of cavity sidewall on the droplet motion is investigated.


1998 ◽  
Vol 518 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sang-Ho Lee ◽  
Myong-Jong Kwon ◽  
Jin-Goo Park ◽  
Yong-Kweon Kim ◽  
Hyung-Jae Shin

AbstractHighly hydrophobic fluorocarbon films were prepared by the vapor phase (VP) deposition method in a vacuum chamber using both liquid (3M's FC40, FC722) and solid sources (perfluorodecanoic acid (CF3(CF2)8COOH), perfluorododecane (C12F26)) on Al, Si and oxide coated wafers. The highest static contact angles of water were measured on films deposited on aluminum substrate. But relatively lower contact angles were obtained on the films on Si and oxide wafers. The advancing and receding contact angle analysis using a captive drop method showed a large contact angle hysteresis (ΔH) on the VP deposited fluorocarbon films. AFM study showed poor film coverage on the surface with large hysteresis. FTIR-ATR analysis positively revealed the stretching band of CF2 groups on the VP deposited substrates. The thermal stability of films was measured at 150°C in air and nitrogen atmospheres as a function of time. The rapid decrease of contact angles was observed on VP deposited FC and PFDA films in air. However, no decrease of contact angle on them was observed in N2.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kostoglou ◽  
Karapantsios

In real life, sessile droplets usually have a three-dimensional shape, making it difficult to understand their forced wetting behavior, both from an experimental and a theoretical perspective. Even in the case of spreading under quasi-static conditions, where the droplet shape is described by the Young–Laplace equation, there is no fundamental approach to describe the contact line evolution. In the present work, a few existing approaches on this issue are analyzed and assessed. It is shown that an experimentally inspired fixed shape for the contact line of droplets that are spreading under the action of tangential forces can be considered equivalent to a theory for contact line motion. There is a lack of experimental data for contact line evolution under arbitrary scenarios of forces. Such data will be very helpful for the further development of the suggested approach to contact line motion. Of particular interest is the case of small contact angle droplets, for which a top view can clearly indicate the contact line location. On the contrary, in such droplets, the direct experimental measurement of contact angle profile is very difficult. This must be estimated theoretically; thus, a special approach has been developed here for this purpose.


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