Breaking bubbles and the water-to-air transport of particulate matter

Bubbles collapsing at an air-liquid interface eject small, high-speed droplets into the adjacent gas phase. The composition of these aersol-sized droplets may be markedly different from the bulk solution in which the bubbles originate. This bubble-breaking/fractionation phenomenon has major implications for a variety of environmental and industrial processes. In preliminary work reported here we have measured the transfer of micron-size latex particles to jet drops produced by the bursting of one-millimeter diameter bubbles. Jet drop concentration was measured as a function of: bulk particle concentration, bulk ionic strength, and depth of bubble release. Results show the droplet concentration to be relatively insensitive to bulk concentration but strongly dependent on ionic strength and trace contaminants.