RADIATION-DRIVEN THERMOCAPILLARY FLOWS IN OPTICALLY THICK LIQUID FILS

A thin liquid film on a horizontal solid surface undergoing radiative heat transfer with an external heat source and the surrounding environment is considered. Thermal gradients along the free surface give rise to a thermocapillary flow in the liquid that is opposed by a hydrostatic pressure gradient within the film. Transient and steady-state solutions are obtained for the interfacial shape and temperature and the velocity field. These results are compared with those from another model, in which a temperature distribution is imposed on the free surface of the film. At a critical value of the dynamic Bond number, a cusp in the form of a free-surface slope discontinuity appears in this fixed free-surface temperature model, but not in the radiation model. When the Bond number is less than this critical value, the time required to thin the film by a significant fraction of its original thickness is much larger with the radiation model. It is shown how the thermal boundary conditions used in the models directly cause these differences.