Marangoni effect

About: Marangoni effect is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 5336 publications have been published within this topic receiving 98562 citations. The topic is also known as: Gibbs–Marangoni effect.

On convection cells induced by surface tension

Abstract: A mechanism is proposed by which cellular convective motion of the type observed by H. Benard, which hitherto has been attributed to the action of buoyancy forces, can also be induced by surface tension forces. Thus when a thin layer of fluid is heated from below, the temperature gradient is such that small variations in the surface temperature lead to surface tractions which cause the fluid to flow and thereby tend to maintain the original temperature variations. A small disturbance analysis, analogous to that carried out by Rayleigh and others for unstable density gradients, leads to a dimensionless number B which expresses the ratio of surface tension to viscous forces, and which must attain a certain minimum critical value for instability to occur. The results obtained are then applied to the original cells described by Benard, and to the case of drying paint films. It is concluded that surface tension forces are responsible for cellular motion in many such cases where the criteria given in terms of buoyancy forces would not allow of instability.

Marangoni effect reverses coffee-ring depositions.

Abstract: We show here both experimentally and theoretically that the formation of “coffee-ring” deposits observed at the edge of drying water droplets requires not only a pinned contact line (Deegan et al. Nature 1997, 389, 827) but also suppression of Marangoni flow. For simple organic fluids, deposition actually occurs preferentially at the center of the droplet, due to a recirculatory flow driven by surface-tension gradients produced by the latent heat of evaporation. The manipulation of this Marangoni flow in a drying droplet should allow one in principle to control and redirect evaporation-driven deposition and assembly of colloids and other materials.

Fast drop movements resulting from the phase change on a gradient surface.

Abstract: The movement of liquid drops on a surface with a radial surface tension gradient is described here. When saturated steam passes over a colder hydrophobic substrate, numerous water droplets nucleate and grow by coalescence with the surrounding drops. The merging droplets exhibit two-dimensional random motion somewhat like the Brownian movements of colloidal particles. When a surface tension gradient is designed into the substrate surface, the random movements of droplets are biased toward the more wettable side of the surface. Powered by the energies of coalescence and collimated by the forces of the chemical gradient, small drops (0.1 to 0.3 millimeter) display speeds that are hundreds to thousands of times faster than those of typical Marangoni flows. This effect has implications for passively enhancing heat transfer in heat exchangers and heat pipes.

Interfacial turbulence: Hydrodynamic instability and the marangoni effect

Abstract: The origin of interfacial turbulence, spontaneous agitation of the interface between two unequilibrated liquids, has been explained in terms of classical flow, diffusion, and surface processes. The essence of the explanation is the long-known though much neglected Marangoni effect, wherein movement in an interface is caused by longitudinal variations of interfacial tension. It is proposed that interfacial turbulence is a manifestation of hydrodynamic instability, which is touched off by ever present, small, random fluctuations about the interface. A simplified mathematical model has been analyzed in order to detail the mechanism of the “interfacial engine” which supplies the mechanical energy of interfacial turbulence. In its present form the analysis incorporates several drastic simplifications, though ways of removing some of these have been suggested. The groundwork has been laid for the more elaborate analyses that are needed for a decisive test of the theory. The analysis shows how some systems may be stable with solute transfer in one direction yet unstable with transfer in the opposite direction, a striking result. It also suggests that interfacial turbulence is usually promoted by (1) solute transfer out of the phase of higher viscosity, (2) solute transfer out of the phase in which its diffusivity is lower, (3) large differences in kinematic viscosity and solute diffusivity between the two phases, (4) steep concentration gradients near the interface, (5) interfacial tension highly sensitive to solute concentration, (6) low viscosities and diffusivities in both phases, (7) absence of surface-active agents, and (8) interfaces of large extent. That some of these effects have been observed in the laboratory lends credence to the theory.