相关论文: Wettability-independent droplet transport by \emph…

Most passive droplet transport strategies rely on spatial variations of material properties to drive droplet motion, leading to gradient-based mechanisms with intrinsic length scales that limit the droplet velocity or the transport…

How to make small liquid droplets move spontaneously and directionally on solid surfaces is a challenge in lab-on-chip technologies, DNA analysis, and heat exchangers. The best-known mechanism, a wettability gradient, does not move droplets…

Passive droplet transport mechanisms, in which continuous external energy input is not required for motion, have received significant attention in recent years. Experimental studies of such mechanisms often ignore, or use careful treatments…

Applications such as digital microfluidics and bio-diagnostics rely on droplet locomotion. A prominent example of such motion is durotaxis, a phenomenon that requires a stiffness gradient along a surface for the transport of liquids, cells,…

We demonstrate spontaneous bidirectional motion of droplets on liquid infused surfaces in the presence of a topographical gradient, in which the droplets can move either toward the denser or the sparser solid fraction area. Our analytical…

Numerous cell-types have shown a remarkable ability to detect and move along gradients in stiffness of an underlying substrate -- a process known as durotaxis. The mechanisms underlying durotaxis are still unresolved, but generally believed…

Earlier works found out spontaneous directional motion of liquid droplets on hydrophilic conical surfaces, however, not hydrophobic case. Here we show that droplets on any surface may take place spontaneous directional motion without…

We study the bendocapillary instability of a liquid droplet that part fills a flexible walled channel. Inspired by experiments in which a `weaving' pattern emerges as droplets of liquid are condensed slowly into deformable microchannels, we…

The transport of small quantities of liquid on a solid surface is inhibited by the resistance to motion caused by the contact between the liquid and the solid. To overcome such resistance, motion can be externally driven through gradients…

Making liquid droplets move spontaneously on solid surfaces is a key challenge in lab-on-chip and heat exchanger technologies. The best-known mechanism, a wettability gradient, does not generally move droplets rapidly enough and cannot…

We study theoretically the self-propulsion dynamics of a small droplet on general curved surfaces by a variational approach. A new reduced model is derived based on careful computations for the capillary energy and the viscous dissipation…

The self-sustained motion of fluids on gradient substrates is a spectacular phenomenon, which can be employed and controlled in applications by carefully engineering the substrate properties. Here, we report on a design of a gel substrate…

A range of technologies require the directed motion of nanoscale droplets on solid substrates. A way of realizing this effect is durotaxis, whereby a stiffness gradient of a substrate can induce directional motion without requiring an…

Here we report a surface curvature-induced directional movement phenomenon, based on molecular dynamics simulations, that a nanoscale water droplet at the outer surface of a graphene cone always spontaneously moves toward the larger end of…

Droplets move on substrates with a spatio-temporal wettability pattern as generated, for example, on light-switchable surfaces. To study such cases, we implement the boundary-element method to solve the governing Stokes equations for the…

We report an experimental investigation of the spontaneous motion of liquid droplets on soft gels with a crosslinking gradient. By systematically adjusting the spatial difference in crosslinking density, we observed that millimeter-sized…

Recently, there is much interest in droplet condensation on soft or liquid/liquid-like substrates. Droplets can deform soft and liquid interfaces resulting in a wealth of phenomena not observed on hard, solid surfaces (e.g., increased…

When a drop of a volatile liquid is deposited on a uniformly heated wettable, thermally conducting substrate, one expects to see it spread into a thin film and evaporate. Contrary to this intuition, due to thermal Marangoni contraction the…

Using extensive molecular dynamics simulation of a coarse-grained model, we demonstrate the possibility of sustained unidirectional motion (durotaxis) of droplets without external energy supply when placed on a polymer brush substrate with…

In experiments, an individual chemically active liquid crystal (LC) droplet submerged in the bulk of a surfactant solution may self-propel along a straight, helical, or random trajectory. In this paper, we develop a minimal model capturing…