Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Capillary flow as the cause of ring stains from dried liquid drops

A Publisher Correction to this article was published on 07 April 2021

This article has been updated

Abstract

When a spilled drop of coffee dries on a solid surface, it leaves a dense, ring-like deposit along the perimeter (Fig. 1a). The coffee—initially dispersed over the entire drop—becomes concentrated into a tiny fraction of it. Such ring deposits are common wherever drops containing dispersed solids evaporate on a surface, and they influence processes such as printing, washing and coating1,2,3,4,5. Ring deposits also provide a potential means to write or deposit a fine pattern onto a surface. Here we ascribe the characteristic pattern of the deposition to a form of capillary flow in which pinning of the contact line of the drying drop ensures that liquid evaporating from the edge is replenished by liquid from the interior. The resulting outward flow can carry virtually all the dispersed material to the edge. This mechanism predicts a distinctive power-law growth of the ring mass with time—a law independent of the particular substrate, carrier fluid or deposited solids. We have verified this law by microscopic observations of colloidal fluids.

a, A 2-cm-diameter drop of coffee containing 1 wt% solids has dried to form a perimeter ring, accentuated in regions of high curvature. b, Spheres in water during evaporation, as described in the text. Multiple exposures are superimposed to indicate the motion of the microspheres.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 2: A ring stain and a demonstration of the physical processes involved in production of such a stain.
Figure 3: Mechanism of outward flow during evaporation.
Figure 4: Double-logarithmic plot of ring mass M(R, t) against time t for times from 10 to 250 seconds after placement of the drop on the surface, for three different drops whose total drying time was about 800 s.

Change history

References

  1. Parisse, F. & Allain, C. Shape changes of colloidal suspension droplets during drying. J. Phys. II 6, 1111–1119 (1996).

    CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. El Bediwi, A. B., Kulnis, W. J., Luo, Y., Woodland, D. & Unertl, W. N. Distributions of latex particles deposited for water suspensions. Mater. Res. Soc. Symp. Proc. 372, 277–282 (1995).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Denkov, N. D. et al. Mechanism of formation of two-dimensional crystals from latex particles on substrates. Langmuir 8, 3183–3190 (1992).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Laden, P. (ed.) Chemistry and Technology of Water Based Inks(Blackie Academic & Professional, London, (1997)).

    Google Scholar 

  5. TAPPI New Printing Technologies Symposium 1996(TAPPI Press, Atlanta, (1996)).

  6. Hisatake, K., Tanaka, S. & Aizawa, Y. Evaporation of water in a vessel. J. Appl. Phys. 73, 7395–7401 (1993).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Peiss, C. N. Evaporation of small water drops maintained at constant volume. J. Appl. Phys. 65, 5235–5237 (1989).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Maxwell, J. C. Scientific Papers Vol. 2(Cambridge, (1890)).

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  9. Jackson, J. D. Classical Electrodynamics2nd edn, 77 (Wiley, New York, (1975)).

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  10. Lide, D. R. (ed.) CRC Handbook of Physics and Chemistry77th edn, 6–8, 6–218 (Chemical Rubber Publishing Co., Boca Raton, FL, (1996)).

    Google Scholar 

  11. Crocker, J. C. & Grier, D. G. Methods of digital video microscopy for colloidal studies. J. Colloid Interface Sci. 179, 298–310 (1996).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank H. Li, X. Shi and M. Baildon for their early contributions to this project; J. Crocker, D. Grier and A. Marcus for sharing their expertise, their image analysis code and their facilities; and S. Garoff, L. Mahadevan, S. Esipov, R. Leheny, D. Mueth, E. Ehrichs, J. Knight, S. Blanton, N. Menon, J. Cina and L. Kadanoff for discussions. This work was supported by the NSF-MRSEC, NSF and DOE.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Robert D. Deegan.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Deegan, R., Bakajin, O., Dupont, T. et al. Capillary flow as the cause of ring stains from dried liquid drops. Nature 389, 827–829 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1038/39827

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/39827

This article is cited by

Comments

By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing