Nonequilibrium Gibbs' criterion for completely wetting volatile liquids

Langmuir. 2014 Oct 14;30(40):11847-52. doi: 10.1021/la502708f. Epub 2014 Sep 30.

Abstract

During the spreading of a liquid over a solid substrate, the contact line can stay pinned at sharp edges until the contact angle exceeds a critical value. At (or sufficiently near) equilibrium, this is known as Gibbs' criterion. Here, we show both experimentally and theoretically that, for completely wetting volatile liquids, there also exists a dynamically-produced contribution to the critical angle for depinning, which increases with the evaporation rate. This suggests that one may introduce a simple modification of the Gibbs' criterion for (de)pinning that accounts for the nonequilibrium effect of evaporation.