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Published on: July 14, 2017
Suppression of bubbles in unstable active liquids via fast evaporation
Qiyun Tang1, Chuan Tang1, Yifan Huang1
1Key Laboratory of Quantum Materials and Devices of Ministry of Education, School of Physics, <a href="https://ror.org/04ct4d772">Southeast University</a>, Nanjng 211189, China.
Abstract:
A common intuition in thermodynamics is that bubbles can spontaneously grow in unstable liquids, which will be detrimental to a variety of physical and chemical processes, such as evaporation-induced self-assembly and electrocatalysis. Here, we show that this common intuition can be significantly reversed by demonstrating a suppression of bubbles in unstable active liquids induced by fast evaporation, which is in contrast to the bubble growth in passive liquids. Such anomalous bubble suppression can be attributed to an activity-induced inversion of pressure difference between bubbles and their surrounding liquid. Moreover, this pressure flip depends on the activity as well as the thermodynamics of passive liquids, and it can generate different kinetic pathways that allow controlling the bubble dynamics in unstable liquids. Our results establish a foundation for promoting applications of unstable active liquids in various physical and chemical processes.
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