On-demand contact line pinning during droplet evaporation

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates how electrowetting-on-dielectrics (EWOD) can precisely control droplet contact line pinning during evaporation, enabling customizable residue patterns on various surfaces.

Contribution

It introduces a method to actively control contact line motion during droplet evaporation using DC-EWOD, allowing for tailored pattern formation on surfaces with minimal contact angle hysteresis.

Findings

Controlled contact line pinning enables pattern customization.

Electrowetting allows pattern formation on flat, homogeneous surfaces.

The method can recover contact line mobility at will.

Abstract

Depending on the contact line motion, colloid-rich drolets evaporation can leave a ring-like or a spot-like residue. Herein, we determine this outcome by controlling the contact line motion using coplanar direct current electrowetting-on-dielectrics (DC-EWOD). Combined with theoretical calculations of the droplet shape and its evaporation rate, the time-dependent actuation voltage is first derived from experiments and simulations. Thanks to the additional control over the contact angle, the contact line can be maintained in pinned state even on surfaces that exhibit little contact angle hysteresis such as homogenous flat Teflon coatings. In the absence of EWOD control, polystyrene particles and Escherichia coli suspended in the droplet formed a dot-like pattern at the center of the initial contact, whereas application of the mechanism resulted in ring-like patterns of a controllable radius. Unlike chemically or structurally patterned substrates, the contact line could recover its mobility at any preset time before reaching the control limit, which is useful to accurately and consistently fabricate self-assembled nanostructures of desired patterns on different surfaces.