Non-Sticky Metal Droplets

Synopsis

Knowing in advance whether an impacting droplet onto a colder target surface will bounce, stick or self-peel has crucial importance in numerous industrial applications such as 3D printing, lithography and fabrication of deicing sprays. Common techniques to control the behavior of a splat includes using chemical agents or altering the molecular structure of surfaces by adding various functional groups.
In this talk I will discuss a recent experiment which introduces a new method to control adhesion of a metal droplet on a solid surface, and proposes a simple model to estimate outcomes of the experiment for a given set of thermal parameters[1].

1- J. de Ruiter, D. Soto & K. K. Varanasi, Self-Peeling of Impacting Droplets, Nature Physics (2017), doi:10.1038/nphys4252.