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Thermocapillary Migration of Liquid Droplets Induced by a Unidirectional Thermal Gradient
Qingwen Dai1,2, M M Khonsari3, Cong Shen3
1College of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, Nanjing University of Aeronautics & Astronautics , Nanjing 210016, China.
Abstract:
A liquid droplet placed on a nonuniformly heated solid surface will migrate from a high-temperature region to a low-temperature region. This study reports the development of a theoretical model and experimental investigation on the migration behavior of paraffin oil droplets induced by the unidirectional thermal gradient. Thin-film lubrication theory is employed to determine the migration velocity of droplets, and temperature dependence of viscosity is taken into account. Comparisons between experimental and numerical results are presented. An effective approach for estimating the thermocapillary migration velocity of droplets on lubrication is proposed.
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