We consider an interface above an attractive hard wall in the complete wetting regime, and submitted to the action of an external increasing, convex potential, and study its delocalization as the intensity of this potential vanishes. Our main motivation is the analysis of critical prewetting, which corresponds to the choice of a linear external potential. We also present partial results on crit...

Joël De Coninck, François Dunlop, Thierry Huillet Abstract: We consider random walks Xn in Z+, obeying a detailed balance condition, with a weak drift towards the origin when Xn ր ∞. We reconsider the equivalence in law between a random walk bridge and a 1+1 dimensional Solid-On-Solid bridge with a corresponding Hamiltonian. Phase diagrams are discussed in terms of recurrence versus wetting. A ...

We present the first nanoscale investigation of silica glaze. High resolution transmission electron microscopy of a rock coating from the Ashikule Basin, Tibetan Plateau, reveals the presence of spheroids composed predominantly of silicon and oxygen with diameters ranging from 20 nm to 70 nm. While silica glaze spheroids co-exist with manganese-rich rock varnish in the same sample, the differen...

We develop an efficient simulation scheme to study a model suspension of equally sized colloidal hard spheres and nonadsorbing ideal polymer coils, both in bulk and adsorbed against a planar hard wall. The many-body character of the polymer-mediated effective interactions between the colloids yields a bulk phase diagram and adsorption phenomena that differ substantially from those found for pai...

X-ray reflectivity measurements of the binary liquid Ga-Bi alloy reveal a dramatically different surface structure above and below the monotectic temperature T(mono) = 222 degrees C. A Gibbs-adsorbed Bi monolayer resides at the surface in both regimes. However, a 30 A thick, Bi-rich wetting film intrudes between the Bi monolayer and the Ga-rich bulk for T>T(mono). The wetting film's internal st...

When a wetting liquid wicks into a fibrous material, it causes the material to deform. In this paper we discuss the elastocapillary effect that leads to spontaneous internal stresses in the materials. The elasto-capillary effect produced by menisci in pores can be identified through a specific stress distribution in the fibrous matrix. We show that the classical Bernoulli problem of a freely ha...

Anisotropic formation of equilibrium-thickness Bi2O3-enriched surficial amorphous films (SAFs) on ZnO has been documented [Luo J, Chiang Y-M. Acta Mater 2000;48:4501]. This study further explores anisotropic wetting of ZnO single crystals by Bi2O3-rich liquid with and without SAFs. For Bi2O3 on the ZnO f11 20g surfaces wherein nanometer-thick SAFs are present in equilibrium with partial wetting...

We consider an interface above an attractive hard wall in the complete wetting regime, and submitted to the action of an external increasing, convex potential, and study its delocalization as the intensity of this potential vanishes. Our main motivation is the analysis of critical prewetting, which corresponds to the choice of a linear external potential. We also present partial results on crit...

We study the wetting by water of complex "hydrophobic-hydrophilic" surfaces made of a hydrophobic substrate covered by a hydrophilic polymer brush. Polystyrene (PS) substrates covered with polystyrene- block-poly(acrylic acid) PS- b-PAA diblock copolymer layers were fabricated by Langmuir-Schaefer depositions and analyzed by atomic force microscopy (AFM) and ellipsometry. On bare PS substrate, ...