Digital image processing of sectorial oscillations for acoustically levitated drops and surface tension measurement

A type of non-axisymmetric oscillations of acoustically levitated drops is excited by modulating the ultrasound field at proper frequencies. These oscillations are recorded by a high speed camera and analyzed with a digital image processing method. They are demonstrated to be the third mode sectorial oscillations, and their frequencies are found to decrease with the increase of equatorial radius of the drops, which can be described by a modified Rayleigh equation. These oscillations decay exponentially after the cessation of ultrasound field modulation. The decaying rates agree reasonably with Lamb’s prediction. The rotating rate of the drops accompanying the shape oscillations is found to be less than 1.5 rounds per second. The surface tension of aqueous ethanol has been measured according to the modified Rayleigh equation. The results agree well with previous reports, which demonstrates the possible application of this kind of sectorial oscillations in noncontact measurement of liquid surface tension.