Capillary Driven Transport Beyond Newtonian Liquids on Microstructured Surfaces

Understanding, predicting, and controlling the capillary-driven transport of complex suspensions on microstructured surfaces has significant implications in diagnostic technologies, additive manufacturing, and advanced thermal management systems. These fluids exhibit behaviors that deviate significantly from classical fluids due to their multiphase nature, particle interactions, and shear-dependent viscosity. While classical theories capture the behavior of Newtonian liquids, more research is needed to generalize these models for complex suspensions interacting with microscale textures. Our study focuses on investigating the hemiwicking behavior of colloidal suspensions containing particles of systematically varied size, concentration, and surface geometry. Using high-speed imaging and optical microscopy, we analyze how these parameters influence the dynamics of spreading, interface morphology, and contact line motion. We use advanced image processing to extract features and identify how particle-scale behavior influences overall spreading dynamics. This framework provides new insight into the physics of non-Newtonian capillary transport, with potential applications in developing diagnostic methods for blood-related disorders and enhancing the accuracy and control of 3D printing processes.