Does water foam exist in microgravity?

H. Caps (1) , G. Delon (1) , N. Vandewalle (1) , R. M. Guillermic (2) , Olivier Pitois (3, 4, 5) , A. L. Biance (4, 6) , L. Saulnier (7) , P. Yazhgur (7) , E. Rio (7) , A. Salonen (7) , D. Langevin (7)

1 Université de Liège
2 IPR - Institut de Physique de Rennes
3 LPMDI - Laboratoire de Physique des Matériaux Divisés et des Interfaces
4 navier umr 8205 - Laboratoire Navier
5 Rhéophysique
6 ILM - Institut Lumière Matière [Villeurbanne]
7 LPS - Laboratoire de Physique des Solides

Liquid foams are omnipresent in everyday life, but little is understood about their properties. On Earth, the liquid rapidly drains out of the foam because of gravity, leading to rupture of the thin liquid films between bubbles. Several questions arise: are liquid foams more stable in microgravity environments? Can pure liquids, such as water, form stable foams in microgravity whereas they do not on Earth? In order to answer these questions, we performed experiments both in parabolic flights and in the International Space Station.

Domains: Civil Engineering; Strongly Correlated Electrons [cond-mat.str-el]; Atomic Physics [physics.atom-ph]

H. Caps, G. Delon, N. Vandewalle, R. M. Guillermic, Olivier Pitois, et al.. Does water foam exist in microgravity?. Europhysics News, 2014, 45 (3), pp.22-25. ⟨10.1051/epn/2014303⟩. ⟨hal-01157342⟩