Wetting and drying of fibers

Stone, Howard

Princeton University, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Engineering Quad, Princeton, New Jersey, USA

Many fibrous materials are found in processes involving wetting and drying. I describe our model studies, mostly with pairs of fibers to examine some basic questions in this area. In particular, I describe (I) the equilibrium shape of a liquid volume – a drop or a column - as function of the spacing between two rigid fibers, (ii) the dynamics and equilibrium when a wetting liquid is placed on two flexible fibers, and (iii) the drying, including the evaporation rate, of a liquid volume held between pairs of rigid or flexible fibers.

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