title: Coalescence of Pickering emulsion droplets induced by an electric field.
abstract: Combining high-speed photography with electric current measurement, we investigate the electrocoalescence of Pickering emulsion droplets. Under a high enough electric field, the originally stable droplets coalesce via two distinct approaches: normal coalescence and abnormal coalescence. In the normal coalescence, a liquid bridge grows continuously and merges two droplets together, similar to the classical picture. In the abnormal coalescence, however, the bridge fails to grow indefinitely; instead, it breaks up spontaneously due to the geometric constraint from particle shells. Such connecting-then-breaking cycles repeat multiple times, until a stable connection is established. In depth analysis indicates that the defect size in particle shells determines the exact merging behaviors: when the defect size is larger than a critical size around the particle diameter, normal coalescence will show up, while abnormal coalescence will appear for coatings with smaller defects.
authors: Department of Physics, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China.
authors: Guo
authors: G
authors: Chen
authors: Peng
authors: P
authors: Tan
authors: Shuyu
authors: S
authors: Chen
authors: Jiping
authors: J
authors: Huang
authors: Weijia
authors: W
authors: Wen
authors: Lei
authors: L
authors: Xu