Eur. Phys. J. E (2013) 36: 116
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2013-13116-x

Regular Article

Coarsening dynamics of three-dimensional levitated foams: From wet to dry

¹ Fachbereich Physik, Universität Konstanz, Universitätsstrasse 10, 78457, Konstanz, Germany
² Physics Institute, University of Zurich, Winterthurerstr. 190, 8057, Zurich, Switzerland

^* e-mail: aegerter@physik.uzh.ch

Received: 20 February 2013
Revised: 17 May 2013
Accepted: 26 September 2013
Published online: 17 October 2013

Abstract

We study diamagnetically levitated foams with widely different liquid fractions. Due to the levitation, drainage is effectively suppressed and the dynamics is driven by the coarsening of the foam bubbles. For dry foams, the bubble size is found to increases as the square root of foam age, as expected from a generalized von Neumann law. At higher liquid content the behavior changes to that of Ostwald ripening where the bubbles grow with the 1/3 power of the age. Using Diffusing Wave Spectroscopy we study the local dynamics in the different regimes and find diffusive behavior for dry foams and kinetic behavior for wet foams.