Counter-Intuitive Evaporation in Nanofluids Droplets due to Stick- Slip Nature

We experimentally investigate the evaporation characteristics of a sessile ethanol droplet containing Al2O3 and Cu nanoparticles of sizes 25 and 75 nm on a heated substrate using shadowgraphy and infrared imaging techniques. Our results demonstrate that the droplet contact line dynamics resulting from the presence of various nanoparticles plays a dominant role in the evaporation process. This is in contrast to the widely held assumption that the enhanced evaporation rate observed in sessile nanofluid droplets is due to the higher thermal conductivity of the added nanoparticles. We observe that even though the thermal conductivity of Al2O3 is an order of magnitude lower than that of Cu, droplets containing 25-nm-sized Al2O3 exhibit pinned contact line dynamics and evaporate much more rapidly than droplets containing Cu nanoparticles of both sizes and 75 nm Al2O3 nanoparticles that exhibit stick-slip behavior. We also found that the droplets with different nanoparticles display distinct thermal patterns due to the difference in contact line behavior, which alters the heat transfer inside the droplets. We establish this counter-intuitive observation by analyzing the temporal variations of the perimeter, free surface area, and deposition patterns on the substrate.

Automated summary

In this experimental study, we investigate the evaporation characteristics of ethanol droplets containing Al2O3 and Cu nanoparticles of different sizes. The results show that the presence of nanoparticles significantly affects the contact line dynamics of the droplets, which in turn affects the evaporation rate. This contradicts the common assumption that the higher thermal conductivity of the added nanoparticles is solely responsible for the enhanced evaporation rate.