General stability criterion for wetting.
We propose a general stability criterion for the wetting of solid substrates, both arbitrarily curved and inhomogeneous. In addition to the classical surface tension, the adhering drops can also exhibit a tension along the contact line where three phases meet, namely, the solid, the liquid, and the environment fluid. Moreover, we show how some stability issues currently debated in the specialized literature of disparate fields could profit from the application of this general criterion.
Rosso
Riccardo
R
Dipartimento di Matematica, Istituto Nazionale di Fisica della Materia, Università di Pavia, Via Ferrata 1, 27100 Pavia, Italy.
Virga
Epifanio G
EG