Interfacial thermodynamics and kinetics

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As dimensions of engineering interest are reduced to smaller scales, the effects of interfaces become more important. Multiphase systems with curved fluid interfaces including bubbles, drops, emulsions, foams and porous media occur in many industries and modern science. Current interest in micro- and nano-scale technologies and new experimental techniques such as surface force microscopy have led to discovery of new phenomena that have yet to be fully explored with thermodynamics. Thermodynamics is the study of mathematical relationships arising from physical laws governing energy and entropy. While thermodynamicists have been interested in curved-fluid-interface effects in multiphase systems for more than 100 years, the most thermodynamically correct work has been done for relatively uncomplicated systems containing few components, having ideal phases and uncomplicated geometries, and lacking other practical complexities. The objectives of the proposed research are to: i) provide equilibrium thermodynamics for a wide range of industrially and scientifically important multi-component systems, and ii) to expand Statistical Rate Theory, a quantum statistical nonequilibrium thermodynamics theory, to predict evaporation rates in nonideal multi-component systems.