Non-Equilibrium Gibbs' Criterion for Completely Wetting Volatile Liquids

Abstract

During the spreading of a liquid over a solid substrate, the contact line can stay pinned at sharp edges until the contact angle exceeds a critical value. At (or sufficiently near) equilibrium, this is known as Gibbs' criterion. Here, we show both experimentally and theoretically that for completely wetting volatile liquids there also exists a dynamically-produced critical angle for depinning, which increases with the evaporation rate. This suggests that one may introduce a simple modification of the Gibbs' criterion for (de)pinning, that accounts for the non-equilibrium effect of evaporation.

References in corpus (4)

• Two-dimensional droplet spreading over random topographical substrates
• Capillary filling in microchannels patterned by posts
• The relation of steady evaporating drops fed by an influx and freely evaporating drops
• Mesoscopic analysis of Gibbs' criterion for sessile nanodroplets on trapezoidal substrates

Cited by in corpus (4)

• Gradient dynamics models for liquid films with soluble surfactant
• Recent advances in and future challenges for mesoscopic hydrodynamic modelling of complex wetting
• Drops on polymer brushes -- advances in thin-film modelling of adaptive substrates
• Stick-slip Dynamics in the Forced Wetting of Polymer Brushes