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Updated: Dec 10, 2025
In Situ SIMS and IR Spectroscopy of Well-defined Surfaces Prepared by Soft Landing of Mass-selected Ions
Published on: June 16, 2014
Desorption energy of soft particles from a fluid interface
Hadi Mehrabian1, Jacco H Snoeijer2, Jens Harting3
1Department of Applied Physics, Eindhoven University of Technology, P.O. Box 513, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands and Physics of Fluids Group and J. M. Burgers Centre for Fluid Dynamics, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7500 AE Enschede, The Netherlands and Chemical Engineering Department, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
Soft particles like microgels bind more strongly to fluid interfaces than rigid ones, enhancing emulsion stability. Their ability to spread and reshape at the interface increases binding energy, even in a collapsed state.
Area of Science:
- Colloid and Interface Science
- Materials Science
- Computational Physics
Background:
- Soft particles are crucial for stabilizing emulsions.
- Understanding particle-interface interactions is key to controlling emulsion properties.
Purpose of the Study:
- To quantify the desorption energy of soft particles from fluid interfaces.
- To compare the binding of soft particles (elastic, microgel) with rigid particles.
Main Methods:
- Coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations.
- Mean thermodynamic integration method for energy computation.
- Analysis of 2D and 3D particle-interface configurations.
Main Results:
- Soft particles exhibit stronger binding than rigid particles due to increased spreading and interfacial area reduction.
- Particle softness offers a reshaping degree of freedom, reducing restoring force during detachment.
- Collapsed microgel particles show higher binding energy than swollen ones.
Conclusions:
- Softness enhances particle-interface adhesion, improving emulsion stabilization.
- The interplay between spreading and reshaping dictates binding strength.
- Microgel state significantly influences their interfacial behavior and binding energy.
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