Superhydrophobic substrates allow the generation of giant quasi-static bubbles

Abstract

We report on experiments of the quasi-static growth and detachment of air bubbles in water from a superhydrophobic substrate, overcoming the maximum size limitation of conventional injectors due to the Rayleigh–Taylor instability. The observations are in good agreement with a hydrostatic model, demonstrating that bubbles grow through a sequence of quasi-equilibrium states. Our experiments corroborate the theoretical prediction of a maximum bubble volume of approximately 6.04π and a critical base radius of 3.22, both numbers in units of the capillary length (Michael & Williams, Proc. R. Soc. Lond. A. vol. 351, 1976, pp. 117–127). This maximum is also reached when bubbles grow in an unbounded, ideally non-wetting surface, establishing the ultimate size limit of quasi-static bubble formation