English

Influence of random roughness on the adhesion between metal surfaces due to capillary condensation

Materials Science 2009-11-13 v1

Abstract

The capillary force was measured by atomic force microscopy between a gold coated sphere mounted on a cantilever and gold surfaces with different roughness. For smooth surfaces the capillary adhesive force surpasses in magnitude any dispersion, e.g. van der Waals/Casimir, and/or electrostatic forces. A substantial decrease in the capillary force was observed by increasing the roughness ampltitude a few nanometers between 1-10 nm. From these measurements two limits can be defined: a smooth limit where a closely macroscopic size contact surface interacts through the capillary force, and the rough limit where only a few asperities give a capillary contribution.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0708.2264,
  title  = {Influence of random roughness on the adhesion between metal surfaces due to capillary condensation},
  author = {P. J. van Zwol and G. Palasantzas and J. Th. M. De Hosson},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0708.2264},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

8 pages, 3 figures, To appear in Appl. Phys. Lett. (2007)