Electrowetting-Induced Oil Film Entrapment and Instability

We investigate the spreading at variable rate of a water drop on a smooth hydrophobic substrate in an ambient oil bath driven by electrowetting. We find that a thin film of oil is entrapped under the drop. Its thickness is described by an extension of the Landau-Levich law of dip coating that includes the electrostatic pressure contribution. Once trapped, the thin film becomes unstable under the competing effects of the electrostatic pressure and surface tension and dewets into microscopic droplets, in agreement with a linear stability analysis. Our results recommend electrowetting as an efficient experimental approach to the fundamental problem of dynamic wetting in the presence of a tunable substrate-liquid interaction

Electrowetting: from basics to applications

Electrowetting has become one of the most widely used tools for manipulating tiny amounts of liquids on surfaces. Applications range from 'lab-on-a-chip' devices to adjustable lenses and new kinds of electronic displays. In the present article, we review the recent progress in this rapidly growing field including both fundamental and applied aspects. We compare the various approaches used to derive the basic electrowetting equation, which has been shown to be very reliable as long as the applied voltage is not too high. We discuss in detail the origin of the electrostatic forces that induce both contact angle reduction and the motion of entire droplets. We examine the limitations of the electrowetting equation and present a variety of recent extensions to the theory that account for distortions of the liquid surface due to local electric fields, for the finite penetration depth of electric fields into the liquid, as well as for finite conductivity effects in the presence of AC voltage. The most prominent failure of the electrowetting equation, namely the saturation of the contact angle at high voltage, is discussed in a separate section. Recent work in this direction indicates that a variety of distinct physical effects¿rather than a unique one¿are responsible for the saturation phenomenon, depending on experimental details. In the presence of suitable electrode patterns or topographic structures on the substrate surface, variations of the contact angle can give rise not only to continuous changes of the droplet shape, but also to discontinuous morphological transitions between distinct liquid morphologies. The dynamics of electrowetting are discussed briefly. Finally, we give an overview of recent work aimed at commercial applications, in particular in the fields of adjustable lenses, display technology, fibre optics, and biotechnology-related microfluidic devices

Shaken not stirred — On internal flow patterns in oscillating sessile drops

We use numerical (volume of fluid) simulations to study the flow in an oscillating sessile drop immersed in an ambient immiscible fluid. The drop is excited by a sinusoidal variation of the contact angle at variable frequency. We identify the eigenfrequencies and eigenmodes of the drops and analyze the internal flow fields by following the trajectories of tracer particles. The flow fields display an oscillatory component as well as a time-averaged mean component. The latter is oriented upward along the surface of the drop from the contact line towards the apex and downward along the symmetry axis. It vanishes at high and low frequencies and displays a broad maximum around f =200–300Hz. We show that the frequency dependence of the mean flow can be described in terms of Stokes drift driven by capillary waves that originate from the contact line, in agreement with recent experiments

Possible correlation effects of surface state electrons on a solid hydrogen film

We have investigated the transport properties of surface state electrons on thin quench-condensed hydrogen films for various electron densities. The surface state electron mobility showed a continuous dependence on the plasma parameter Gamma in the range from 20 to 130, indicating a strong influence of correlation effects within the electron system for all measured values of Gamma

Capillarity-driven dynamics of water–alcohol mixtures in nanofluidic channels

We investigated the spontaneous capillarity-driven filling of nanofluidic channels with a thickness of 6 and 16 nm using mixtures of ethanol and water of variable composition. To improve the visibility of the fluid, we embedded metal mirrors into the top and bottom walls of the channels that act as a Fabry–Pérot interferometer. The motion of propagating liquid–air menisci was monitored for various concentrations in transmission with an optical microscope. In spite of the visible effects of surface roughness and different affinity of water and ethanol to the channel walls, the dynamics followed the classical t 1/2—dependence according to Lucas and Washburn. While the prefactor of this algebraic relation falls short of the expectations based on bulk properties by 10–30%, the relative variation between mixtures of different composition follows the expectations based on the bulk surface tension and viscosity, implying that—despite the small width of the channels and the large surface-to-volume ratio—specific adsorption or chemical selectivity effects are not relevant. We briefly discuss the impact of surface roughness on our experimental results

Rheological properties of aging thermosensitive suspensions

Aging observed in soft glassy materials inherently affects the rheological properties of these systems and has been described by the soft glassy rheology (SGR) model [S. M. Fielding et al., J. Rheol. 44, 323 (2000)]. In this paper, we report the measured linear rheological behavior of thermosensitive microgel suspensions and compare it quantitatively with the predictions of the SGR model. The dynamic moduli [G[prime](omega,t) and G[double-prime](omega,t)] obtained from oscillatory measurements are in good agreement with the model. The model also predicts quantitatively the creep compliance J(t−tw,tw), obtained from step stress experiments, for the short time regime [(t−tw)<tw]. The relative effective temperature [script X]/[script X]g obtained from both the oscillatory and the step stress experiments is indeed less than 1 ([script X]/[script X]g<1) in agreement with the definition of aging. Moreover, the elasticity of the compressed particles (Gp) increases with increased compression, i.e., the degree of hindrance and consequently also the bulk elasticity (G[prime] and 1/J) increases with the degree of compression

Device for rheometry, impedance spectroscopy, and electrochemistry on fluid electrodes

We describe the extension of a rheometer to enable in situ impedance spectroscopy and electrochemical cycling. Key advantages of this instrument over traditional flow-channel based methods for studying fluid electrodes are the possibilities to monitor the rheological properties during cycling as well as to control the mechanical history of the sample. We describe two electrochemical configurations of the instrument, allowing fluid electrodes to be studied as full and half-cells. To demonstrate the systems' capabilities, we present characterizations of 4 different fluid electrode systems