Due to an increase in demand of petroleum products which are transported by vessels or exported by pipelines, oil spill management becomes a controversial issue in coastal environment safety as well as making serious financial problems. After spilling oil in the water body, oil spreads as a thin layer on the water surface. Currents, waves and wind are the main causes of oil slick transport. The...

We report direct Monte Carlo (MC) simulations on the liquid-vapor interfaces of pure water, carbon dioxide, and hydrogen sulfide. In the case of water, the recent TIP4P/2005 potential model used with the MC method is shown to reproduce the experimental surface tension and to accurately describe the coexistence curves. The agreement with experiments is also excellent for CO(2) and H(2)S with sta...

Giant lipid vesicles are closed compartments consisting of semi-permeable shells, which isolate femto- to pico-liter quantities of aqueous core from the bulk. Although water permeates readily across vesicular walls, passive permeation of solutes is hindered. In this study, we show that, when subject to a hypotonic bath, giant vesicles consisting of phase separating lipid mixtures undergo osmoti...

Electrolytes interact with water in many ways: changing dipole orientation, inducing charge transfer, and distorting the hydrogen-bond network in the bulk and at interfaces. Numerous experiments and computations have detected short-range perturbations that extend up to three hydration shells around individual ions. We report a multiscale investigation of the bulk and surface of aqueous electrol...

The gecko adhesive system is dependent on weak van der Waals interactions that are multiplied across thousands of fine hair-like structures (setae) on geckos' toe pads. Due to the requirements of van der Waals forces, we expect that any interruption between the setae and substrate, such as a water layer, will compromise adhesion. Our recent results suggest, however, that the air layer (plastron...

Highly monodisperse poly(N-isopropylacrylamide), PNiPAM, microgels were prepared by the conventional radical polymerization of NiPAM in the presence of dimethylamino ethyl methacrylate (DMAEMA) monomers at various concentrations. The effect of DMAEMA on the polymerization of PNiPAM microgels was examined at constant initiator (V50) and cross-linker (MBA) concentrations. The presence of DMAEMA i...

We present an experimental study on the adsorption behaviour of Intan-100, a nonionic surfactant, at the bitumen/water interface when the density difference between the two phases is increased by diluting the crude oil with 10% Xylene by weight or using heavy water (Deuterium Oxide) as the aqueous phase. Their equilibrium interfacial tension, surface excess and critical micelle concentration of...

Multi phase fluids are common in energy-related geotechnical problems, including gaswater, gas-oil, ice-water, hydrate-water, and oil-water fluid conditions. The generalization of classical unsaturated soil mechanics concepts to energy geotechnology requires physical understanding of surface tension, contact angle, capillary pressure, solubility and nucleation. Eventually, these pore-level proc...

A spray retention model was used in this study to explore theoretically the effect of a range of mixture surface tension on the spray retention and the variability of deposits. The spray retention model was based on an algorithm that tested whether droplets from a virtual nozzle intercepted a 3D plant model. If so, the algorithm determined the contribution of the droplet to the overall retentio...

BACKGROUND The anomalous properties of water have been of great interest for generations of scientists. However the impact of small amount of deuterium content which is always present in water has never been explored before. For the first time the fundamental properties of deuterium depleted (light) water at 4°C and 20°C are here presented. RESULTS The obtained results show the important role...