Quasi-steady-state flows in a liquid film in a gas: Comparison of two methods of describing waves

The motion of thin films of a viscous incompressible liquid in a gas under the action of capillary forces is studied. The surface tension depends on the surfactant concentration, and the liquid is nonvolatile. The motion is described by the well-known model of quasi-steady-state viscous film flow. The linear-wave solutions are compared with the solution using the Navier-Stokes equations. Situations are studied where a solution close to the inviscid two-dimensional solutions exists and in the case of long wavelength, the occurrence of sound waves in the film due to the Gibbs surface elasticity is possible. The behavior of the exact solutions near the region of applicability of asymptotic equations is studied, and nonmonotonic dependences of the wave characteristics on wavenumber are obtained. __________ Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 48, No. 3, pp. 103–111, May–June, 2007.