The laws of wetting are well known for drops on rigid surfaces but change dramatically when
the substrate is soft and deformable. The combination of wetting and the intricacies of soft …

The shape of a soft solid is largely determined by the balance between elastic and surface
energies with capillarity becoming important at length scales smaller than the elastocapillary …

Drops in contact with swollen, elastomeric substrates can induce a capillary mediated phase
separation in wetting ridges. Using confocal microscopy, we visualize phase separation of …

When a water drop is placed onto a soft polymer network, a wetting ridge develops at the
drop periphery. The height of this wetting ridge is typically governed by the drop surface …

Commercial silicone elastomers are commonly used in soft materials research due to their
easily tunable mechanical properties. However, conventional polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) …

The spreading of liquid drops on soft substrates is extremely slow, owing to strong
viscoelastic dissipation inside the solid. A detailed understanding of the spreading dynamics …

Understanding surface mechanics of soft solids, such as soft polymeric gels, is crucial in
many engineering processes, such as dynamic wetting and adhesive failure. In these …

The surface mechanics of soft solids are important in many natural and technological
applications. In this context, static and dynamic wetting of soft polymer gels has emerged as …

Hypothesis The conventional solid–solid contact is well studied in the literature. However, a
number of practical applications, such as adhesive patches and biomimetic surfaces, require …

Hydrogels are commonly used in research and energy, manufacturing, agriculture, and
biomedical applications. These uses typically require hydrogel mechanics and internal …