Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Enhanced Evaporation Of Water Droplets Due To Surface Contamination, Robert Bernard Hughes

Masters Theses

"Experimental evidence for enhanced evaporation of small (3-9 µ radius) water droplets are presented. Both "pure" droplets and droplets contaminated with surface active materials fell into air of known relative humidity (96-99 per cent) at an ambient temperature of 29.9C and evaporated. The rates of evaporation were determined by photographing the evaporating drops, measuring the distance a drop fell during a fixed time interval, and applying Stokes law. The contaminated droplets exhibited a rate of evaporation 1.8µ² sec⁻¹ faster than "pure" drops. This can be compared with rates for pure drops of 1.9 and 5.7µ² sec⁻¹ at 0.1 and 0.3C …