Nonlocal Dynamics of Spontaneous Imbibition Fronts

Dimitrios Geromichalos, Friedrich Gunther Mugele, Stephan Herminghaus

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Abstract

We have studied spontaneous imbibition fronts generated by capillary rise between two roughened glass plates, the separation d of which varied between 10 and 50¿¿¿¿m. Perfect agreement with Washburn¿s law was obtained. We have determined the roughness exponent ¿ of the fronts, and found ¿=0.81±0.01 for small length scales. Above a certain crossover length ¿, it reached ¿=0.58±0.04, as predicted by the quenched noise Kardar-Parisi-Zhang equation. The crossover length is found to scale with the plate separation as sqrt[d], as predicted by recent models which properly include nonlocal dynamics effects on the front. We believe this to be the first clear identification of crossover from nonlocal to local dynamics.
Original languageUndefined
JournalPhysical review letters
Volume89
Issue number10
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2002

Keywords

  • IR-57259

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