title: Spreading of viscous fluid drops on a solid substrate assisted by thermal fluctuations.
abstract: We study the spreading of viscous drops on a solid substrate, taking into account the effects of thermal fluctuations in the fluid momentum. A nonlinear stochastic lubrication equation is derived and studied using numerical simulations and scaling analysis. We show that asymptotically spreading drops admit self-similar shapes, whose average radii can increase at rates much faster than these predicted by Tanner's law. We discuss the physical realizability of our results for thin molecular and complex fluid films, and predict that such phenomenon can in principal be observed in various flow geometries.
authors.affiliation: Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA.
authors.forename: Benny
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Davidovitch
authors.forename: Esteban
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Moro
authors.forename: Howard A
authors.initials: HA
authors.lastname: Stone