Practical Insights to Thin Film Dewetting

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Gadelrab, Karim, Reimann-Zitz, Stefan
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2026
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author Gadelrab, Karim
Reimann-Zitz, Stefan
author_facet Gadelrab, Karim
Reimann-Zitz, Stefan
contents Thin liquid films exhibit rich instability and rupture dynamics that critically impact coating performance across many applications. In this work, we use the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) simulations within a lubrication-theory framework to systematically quantify how film thickness, surface energy, wettability, and intermolecular forces govern dewetting kinetics and long-time morphology. Master-curve scalings are identified for the time to dewet, revealing a strong power-law sensitivity to film thickness and a comparatively weak dependence on moderate variations in the contact angle. Following rupture, the film reaches a physically meaningful coverage plateau, whose magnitude correlates with material parameters and provides a practical window for morphological stabilization prior to coarsening. Long-time evolution obeys classical coarsening scaling laws, with surface energy controlling domain density. These results demonstrate that lubrication-based models can deliver predictive design guidance for evaluating coating robustness and forming materials and surface engineering strategies. Source code is available at https://github.com/Zitzeronion/Swalbe.jl.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_27192
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Practical Insights to Thin Film Dewetting
Gadelrab, Karim
Reimann-Zitz, Stefan
Materials Science
Thin liquid films exhibit rich instability and rupture dynamics that critically impact coating performance across many applications. In this work, we use the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) simulations within a lubrication-theory framework to systematically quantify how film thickness, surface energy, wettability, and intermolecular forces govern dewetting kinetics and long-time morphology. Master-curve scalings are identified for the time to dewet, revealing a strong power-law sensitivity to film thickness and a comparatively weak dependence on moderate variations in the contact angle. Following rupture, the film reaches a physically meaningful coverage plateau, whose magnitude correlates with material parameters and provides a practical window for morphological stabilization prior to coarsening. Long-time evolution obeys classical coarsening scaling laws, with surface energy controlling domain density. These results demonstrate that lubrication-based models can deliver predictive design guidance for evaluating coating robustness and forming materials and surface engineering strategies. Source code is available at https://github.com/Zitzeronion/Swalbe.jl.
title Practical Insights to Thin Film Dewetting
topic Materials Science
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.27192