Behavior of Liquid Bridges between Nonparallel Surfaces

Formation of liquid bridges between two solid surfaces is frequently observed in industry and nature, e.g. printing. When the two solid surfaces are not parallel (with dihedral angle between them), two significant phenomena emerge in the bridge behavior: First, if exceed a critical angle (_c), the bridge is no longer stable and propel itself horizontally towards the cusp of the surfaces. Second, if a stable bridge is squeezed and stretched, a horizontal bulk motion of the bridge along the surfaces can be observed. Through both experimental and numerical studies, we demonstrated that _c can be increased by increasing advancing contact angle (_a), and Contact Angle Hysteresis (CAH) of the surfaces. We also demonstrated that the magnitude of the bulk motion can be increased by increasing , the amount of compressing and stretching, and/or by decreasing _a and CAH of the surfaces.