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CPP: Fachverband Chemische Physik und Polymerphysik

CPP 35: Poster Session II

CPP 35.63: Poster

Wednesday, March 29, 2023, 11:00–13:00, P1

Droplets sliding on compressed soft surfaces — •Youchuang Chao, Hansol Jeon, and Stefan Karpitschka — Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, 37077 Göttingen, Germany

The motion of droplets on rigid substrates is mainly slowed up by the viscous dissipation inside the liquid phase. However, this does not hold for droplets sliding on soft substrates: viscoelastic dissipation inside solid phase now dominates the motion, leading to `viscoelastic breaking". A recent study revealed that droplets move anisotropically on soft, pre-stretched solids, which is incompatible with the classical visco-elastocapillary wetting theory. Here, we impose a compression rather than a stretch on the soft solid, and explore how pre-compression influences the droplet speed. Intriguingly, we observe a non-monotonic dependence of the sliding speed on the pre-strain: a minimal speed exists as the solid is consecutively compressed. This may enrich our current understanding of elastocapillarity, for instance, in tissue engineering where soft materials are frequently squeezed.