Tetra Point Wetting at the Free Surface of Liquid Ga-Bi
arXiv:cond-mat/0205506 · doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.89.035502
Abstract
A continuous surface wetting transition, pinned to a solid/liquid/liquid/vapor tetra coexistence point, is studied by x-ray reflectivity in liquid Ga-Bi binary alloys. The short-range surface potential is determined from the measured temperature evolution of the wetting film. The thermal fluctuations are shown to be insufficient to induce a noticeable breakdown of mean-field behavior, expected in short-range-interacting systems due to their $d_u=3$ upper critical dimensionality.
4 pages (RevTeX 4), 3 eps figures, submitted to Physical Review Letters