But at lower air pressure, a liquid droplet does not splash at all

by Moises Jafet — on
Tiempo de Lectura aprox.: 0 minutes, 48 Segundos

In stop-action photographs taken half a century ago, Harold Edgerton, the M.I.T. professor who invented the electronic flash, famously captured the balletic disintegration of a milk drop, splashing upward in the shape of a tiny crown.

But at lower air pressure, a liquid droplet does not splash at all as it hits a flat glass surface, physicists at the University of Chicago discovered. Instead, the droplet of alcohol about one-eighth of an inch wide just flattens and flows away.

"You still need something else to kind of lift this thing up," said one of the researchers, Lei Xu, a graduate student.

Air friction creates a splash, above, by slowing the liquid as it tries to flatten out, distorting its flow and breaking it apart, the Chicago physicists said.

The findings, which could help improve inkjet printing and internal combustion engines, were reported last month at a meeting of the American Physical Society in Los Angeles.

Source: The New York Times

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Moisés Jafet Cornelio-Vargas

About Moisés

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Physicists, award-winning technologist, parallel entrepreneur, consultant and proud father born in the Dominican Republic.
Interested in HPC, Deep Learning, Semantic Web, Internet Global High Scalability Apps, InfoSec, eLearning, General Aviation, Formula 1, Classical Music, Jazz, Sailing and Chess.
Founder of pluio.com and hospedio.com.
Author of the Sci-fi upcoming novel Breedpeace and co-author in dozens of publications.
Co-founder of MunicipiosAlDia.com, Jalalio Media Consultants and a number of other start-ups.
Former professor and Key-note speaker in conferences and congresses all across the Americas and Europe.
Proud member of the Microchip No.1 flying towards Interestellar space on board NASA's Stardust Mission, as well as member of Fundación Municipios al Día, Fundación Loyola, Fundación Ciencias de la Documentación and a number of other non-for profit, professional organizations, Open Source projects and Chess communities around the world.
All opinions here are his own's and in no way associated with his business interests or collaborations with third-parties.