NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF DROPLET DEPOSITION AND SELF-ALIGNMENT ON A MICROSTRUCTURED SURFACE

Numerical simulation is performed for droplet impact and deposition on a microstructured surface. The droplet deformation is calculated by a sharp-interface level-set method which is extended to treat the immersed solid structure and the contact angle at the liquid-gas-solid interline. The computations are further carried out to investigate the droplet self-alignment behavior derived by the interfacial characteristics between the liquid-gas-solid phases, which can be used to overcome a droplet placement error and to improve the accuracy in film formation. The effects of contact angle, surface tension, and microstructure configuration on the droplet deposition are quantified.