Conference: "Bursting soap bubbles – does the environment matter?"
Taught by: Dr. Uddalok Sen, Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, The Netherlands
Date: Wednesday, December 14, 2022.
Time: 12:30 to 1:30 p.m.
Location: Classroom 006, Higher Technical School of Engineering, University of Seville.
Organized by: Fluid Mechanics Research Group of the University of Seville (GIMFus)

Next Wednesday, December 14 at 12:30 p.m., the conference "Electric Energy Systems. Sustainable electric mobility" will be held by Dr. Uddalok Sen, Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, The Netherlands.

Conference "Bursting soap bubbles – does the environment matter?" by Uddalok Sen

Floating soap bubbles are often a sight to be held, particularly due to the plethora of colors they demonstrate as light gets reflected from the soap film. However, soap bubbles (or films) are inherently ephemeral, and burst soon after they are formed – often to the disappointment of the mesmerized observer. Interestingly, this bursting phenomenon itself is rich in physics, and has fascinated fluid dynamicists for nearly two centuries. Despite the long history of studying this bursting phenomenon, several key questions are still unanswered; in particular, what role, if any, the environment plays in the physics of bursting. In this talk, I will revisit this age-old problem, with an emphasis on studying the influence of the environment on the physics of bursting soap bubbles. I will show that high-speed imaging reveals new scalings in the dynamics of bursting films in an environment, which can be further explained through scaling analysis and numericals. The findings of this talk are not only of fundamental importance, but are also relevant in understanding, and thus mitigating, oil spills in oceans and the spread of respiratory diseases via aerosols.