Short time dynamics of viscous drop spreading
Abstract
Liquid drops start spreading directly after coming into contact with a solid sub- strate. Although this phenomenon involves a three-phase contact line, the spread- ing motion can be very fast. We experimentally study the initial spreading dy- namics, characterized by the radius of the wetted area, for viscous drops. Using high-speed imaging with synchronized bottom and side views gives access to 6 decades of time resolution. We show that short time spreading does not exhibit a pure power-law growth. Instead, we find a spreading velocity that decreases logarithmically in time, with a dynamics identical to that of coalescing viscous drops. Remarkably, the contact line dissipation and wetting effects turn out to be unimportant during the initial stages of drop spreading.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1209.6150,
title = {Short time dynamics of viscous drop spreading},
author = {Antonin Eddi and Koen G. Winkels and Jacco H. Snoeijer},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1209.6150},
year = {2015}
}