Revisiting the fine structure of the triple line

The fine structure of the triple line for water droplets deposited on porous polymer substrates was investigated. Substrates were obtained with the breath-figures self-assembly. Water droplets demonstrated the pronounced Cassie-Baxter wetting regime. The triple line was imaged with environmental scanning electron microscopy. The roughness of a triple line was characterized with its averaged root-mean-square (rms) width w(L), and its scaling experimental dependence upon the length L of the triple line w(L) â̂ L^ζ was analyzed. The values of exponents in the range of 0.60-063 were established. The deduced values of ζ evidence the local nature of the triple-line elasticity and support the idea that the elastic potential of the triple line includes only even powers of the displacement.