Measuring The Surface Energy of A Liquid
As first described by Thomas Young in 1805 in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, it is the interaction between the forces of cohesion and the forces of adhesion which determines whether or not wetting, the spreading of a liquid over a surface, occurs. If complete wetting does not occur, then a bead of liquid will form, with a contact angle which is a function of the surface energies of the system.
Surface energy is most commonly quantified using a contact angle goniometer and a number of different methods.
Read more about this topic: Surface Energy
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