Exact solutions to the interfacial surfactant transport equation on a droplet in a Stokes flow regime

In the research literature there exist very rare analytical solutions of the surfactant transport equation on an interface. In the present article, we derive sets of exact solutions to interfacial convection-diffusion equations which describe the interfacial transport of insoluble surfactants in a two-phase flow. The investigated model is based on a Stokes flow setting where a spherical shaped inner phase is dispersed in an outer phase. Under the assumption of the small capillary number, the deformation of the spherical phase interface is not taken into account. Neglecting the dependence of the surface tension on the interfacial surfactant concentration, hence neglecting the Marangoni effect, general exact solutions to the surfactant conservation law on the spherical surface with both convective and diffusive terms are provided by means of Heun's confluent function. For the steady case, it is shown that these solutions collapse to a simple exponential form. Furthermore, for the purely diffusive problem, exact solutions are constructed using Legendre polynomials. Such analytical solutions are very valuable as benchmark problems in numerical investigations. (C) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.