Issue 5, 2023

Rifts in rafts

Abstract

A particle raft floating on an expanding liquid substrate provides a macroscopic analog for studying material failure. The time scales in this system allow both particle-relaxation dynamics and rift formation to be resolved. In our experiments, a raft, an aggregate of particles, is stretched uniaxially by the expansion of the air–liquid interface on which it floats. Its failure morphology changes continuously with pulling velocity. This can be understood as a competition between two velocity scales: the speed of re-aggregation, in which particles relax towards a low-energy configuration determined by viscous and capillary forces, and the difference of velocity between neighboring particles caused by the expanding liquid surface area. This competition selects the cluster length, i.e., the distance between adjacent rifts. A model based on this competition is consistent with the experimental failure patterns.

Graphical abstract: Rifts in rafts

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
04 Nov 2022
Accepted
31 Dec 2022
First published
02 Jan 2023

Soft Matter, 2023,19, 905-912

Author version available

Rifts in rafts

K. Tô and S. R. Nagel, Soft Matter, 2023, 19, 905 DOI: 10.1039/D2SM01451C

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