Abstract
Understanding the penetration of liquids within textile fibers is critical for the development of next-generation smart textiles. Despite substantial research on liquid penetration in the plane of the textile, little is known about how the liquid penetrates in the thickness direction. Here we report a time-resolved high-resolution X-ray measurement of the motion of the liquid-air interface within a single layer textile, as the liquid is transported across the textile thickness following the deposition of a droplet. The measurement of the time-dependent position of the liquid meniscus is made possible by the use of ultrahigh viscosity liquids (dynamic viscosity from 105 to 2.5 × 106times larger than water). This approach enables imaging due to the slow penetration kinetics. Imaging results suggest a three-stage penetration process with each stage being associated with one of the three types of capillary channels existing in the textile geometry, providing insights into the effect of the textile structure on the path of the three-dimensional liquid meniscus. One dimensional kinetics studies show that our data for the transplanar penetration depth ΔxL vs time do not conform to a power law, and that the measured rate of penetration for long times is smaller than that predicted by Lucas-Washburn kinetics, challenging commonly held assumptions regarding the validity of power laws when applied to relatively thin textiles.
Highlights
The prediction of liquid transport in textiles plays an important role in many applications, from the design of liquid repellent textiles for skin protection [1, 2], to the development of resin impregnation methodologies [3, 4], and the manufacturing of textiles with improved wearability [5, 6]
We have examined the diameters of the capillary pores and of the fibers in the X-ray Computed Tomography (XCT) images by averaging over 15 fibers for each diameter value reported
We have examined by X-ray tomography and radiography imaging the time-dependent transport of ultrahigh viscosity liquids in the transplanar direction following the deposition of a small droplet on the surface of a single-layer textile
Summary
The prediction of liquid transport in textiles plays an important role in many applications, from the design of liquid repellent textiles for skin protection [1, 2], to the development of resin impregnation methodologies [3, 4], and the manufacturing of textiles with improved wearability [5, 6] Classical problems in this field are the prediction of wicking rates in experiments where the textiles are put in contact with large liquid volumes 7, the analysis of the liquid distribution due to moisture condensation 8, and the prediction of in-plane and transplanar liquid transport following drop deposition [9, 10]. Transplanar penetration is a relatively fast process 21, and is often neglected when examining the long-time behavior of the liquid
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