Slow viscous flow near a superhydrophobic surface with trapped gas bubbles

The Boundary Element Method (BEM) is used to solve the problem of Stokes flow of a viscous fluid over a periodic striped texture of a superhydrophobic surface (SHS), partially filled with frictionless gas bubbles. The shape of the bubble surfaces and the position of the meniscus pinning points relative to the cavity walls are taken into account in the study. Two kinds of flows important for practical applications are considered: a pressure-driven flow in a thin channel with a bottom superhydrophobic wall and a shear-driven flow over a periodic texture. We study the flow pattern in the fluid over a single cavity containing a bubble with a curved phase interface shifted into the cavity. A parametric numerical study of the averaged slip length of the SHS is performed as a function of the geometric parameters of the texture. It is shown that the curvature of the phase interface and/or its shift into the cavity both result in the decrease in the average slip length. It is demonstrated that the BEM can be an efficient tool for studying Stokes flows over textured superhydrophobic surfaces with different geometries of microcavities and phase interfaces. (© 2017 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)