Anomalously Slow Dewetting of Colloidal Particles at a Liquid/Gas Interface

Abstract

We consider the anomalously slow dewetting of colloidal particles adsorbed at a liquid/gas interface. The particles move in the vertical direction under the action of a regular capillary force and an irregular force caused by defects (roughness and chemical heterogeneity). The particle diffusion is modeled by a random walk over a potential minima with jump rates determined by the Arrhenius law. The averaged particle motion is found under the assumption of Gaussian distributions for characteristic properties of spatial heterogeneities.