Pinning of a solid-liquid-vapor interface

We propose a macroscopic Hamiltonian approach to study the pinning (sticking) of a solid-liquid-vapor contact line by pinning centers on the solid. We have so far studied the case of a vertical solid immersed into a liquid in the presence of gravity, but the method is general and can easily be extended to other geometries with and without gravity. Using computer simulations the method can be used to give a nonperturbative estimate for whether pinning centers interact cooperatively or independently in the pinning of the contact line.