Conceptual aspects of line tensions

We analyze two representative systems containing a three-phase-contact line: a liquid lens at a fluid-fluid interface and a liquid drop in contact with a gas phase residing on a solid substrate. In addition we study a system containing a planar liquid-gas interface in contact with a solid substrate. We discuss to which extent the decomposition of the grand canonical free energy of such systems into volume, surface, and line contributions is unique in spite of the freedom one has in positioning the Gibbs dividing interfaces. Curvatures of interfaces are taken into account. In the case of a lens it is found that the line tension is independent of arbitrary choices of the Gibbs dividing interfaces. In the case of a drop, however, one arrives at two different possible definitions of the line tension. One of them corresponds seamlessly to that applicable to the lens. The line tension defined this way turns out to be independent of choices of the Gibbs dividing interfaces. In the case of the second definition, however, the line tension does depend on the choice of the Gibbs dividing interfaces. We also provide form invariant equations for the equilibrium contact angles which properly transform under notional shifts of dividing interfaces which change the description of the system but leave the density configurations unchanged. It is shown that in order to accomplish this form invariance, additional stiffness coefficients attributed to the contact line must be introduced. The choice of the dividing interfaces influences the actual values of the stiffness coefficients. We show how these coefficients transform as a function of the relative displacements of the dividing interfaces. Our formulation provides a clearly defined scheme to determine line properties from measured dependences of the contact angles on lens or drop volumes. This scheme implies relations different from the modified Neumann or Young equations, which currently are the basis for extracting line tensions from experimental data. These relations show that the experiments do not render the line tension alone but a combination of the line tension, the Tolman length, and the stiffness coefficients of the line. In contrast to previous approaches our scheme works consistently for any choice of the dividing interfaces. It further allows us to compare results obtained by different experimental or theoretical methods, based on different conventions of choosing the dividing interfaces. (C) 2007 American Institute of Physics.