物理學(xué)家終于發(fā)現(xiàn)了肥皂泡變大的秘密

物理學(xué)家終于發(fā)現(xiàn)了肥皂泡變大的秘密

With the right patience and finesse, you can get soap bubbles to grow to enormous sizes. At their most gigantic, with surface areas approaching 100 metres squared (over 1,000 square feet), these globules can get large enough to hold entire cars within their fragile grasp.

只要有足夠的耐心和技巧，你就能讓肥皂泡變得很大。最大表面積可以接近100平方米(超過1000平方英尺)，足以將整個(gè)汽車都控制在其脆弱的包裹范圍內(nèi)。

Stretched out to extreme lengths, a bubble's microscopically thin walls will begin to glisten like a rainbow, which raises the question: how can something just a few microns thick, roughly as wide as a wavelength of light, exist without exploding?

當(dāng)氣泡延伸到極端長(zhǎng)度時(shí)，氣泡的薄壁將開始像彩虹一樣閃閃發(fā)光，這就出現(xiàn)了一個(gè)問題：為什么只有幾微米厚的東西，大約與一波長(zhǎng)的光一樣寬的物體如何能在不爆炸的情況下存在?

After more than a year of research, physicists at Emory University have figured out what makes the perfect gigantic bubble so stable.

經(jīng)過一年多的研究，埃默里大學(xué)的物理學(xué)家們，已經(jīng)找到了使完美的巨型泡沫如此穩(wěn)定的原因。

The absolute Goldilocks of bubble mixtures, they say, is one that gives a bit of stretch, allowing the fluid to flow a little, but not too much that it runs amok.

他們說，泡沫混合物的絕對(duì)“適居性”是一種能讓液體稍稍流動(dòng)，但又不會(huì)太過泛濫的混合物。

"We basically started making bubbles and popping them, and recorded the speed and dynamics of that process," says physicist Justin Burton.

物理學(xué)家賈斯汀·伯頓說:“我們基本上是先制造氣泡，然后把它們弄爆，然后記錄下這個(gè)過程的速度和動(dòng)態(tài)。”

"Focusing on a fluid at its most violent moments can tell you a lot about its underlying physics."

“關(guān)注流體最劇烈的時(shí)刻，可以讓你了解它的許多基本物理特性。”

Time and time again, the best bubbles came from solutions of water and soap that also contained polymers - a substance with a long chain of repeating molecules, usually found in lubricants.

一次又一次，最好的泡泡來自于含有聚合物的水和肥皂溶液，聚合物是一種長(zhǎng)鏈重復(fù)分子的物質(zhì)，通常存在于潤(rùn)滑油中。

With their long strands tangling together, Burton says polymers can act like a 'hairball' in soap solution, stopping the walls from breaking apart.

伯頓說，當(dāng)聚合物的長(zhǎng)鏈纏繞在一起時(shí)，聚合物在肥皂溶液中的作用就像一個(gè)“毛球”，可以阻止墻壁破裂。

"Polymers of different sizes become even more entangled than single-sized polymers, strengthening the elasticity of the film," explains Burton.

伯頓解釋說：“不同尺寸的聚合物比單一尺寸的聚合物更容易纏結(jié)，增強(qiáng)了薄膜的彈性。”。

"That's a fundamental physics discovery."

“這是一個(gè)基本的物理發(fā)現(xiàn)。”

The study was published in Physical Review Fluids.

這項(xiàng)研究發(fā)表在《物理評(píng)論》雜志上。