EXOTIC BEHAVIOR OF REACTIVE-WETTING OF METAL ON METAL-ON-GLASS IN ROOM TEMPERATURE

We present non-trivial spatio-temporal patterns observed in reactive-wetting of mercury droplets spreading on thin metal (silver or gold) films on glass at room temperature. This is the only known study of reactive-wetting at room temperature. We show that there exist two main regimes, the bulk propagation regime and the interface kinetic roughening regime. In both regimes, rich spatio-temporal patterns are observed. We study and characterize these patterns using statistical physics tools, such as the growth, roughness and persistence exponents, and show the manifestation of surface tension relaxation in these statistical measures.