Viscous fingering with chemical reaction: effect of in-situ production of surfactants

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Abstract
Viscous fingering experiments are performed in a radial Hele-Shaw cell for a liquid–liquid system in the presence of a well-characterized interfacial reaction capable of changing the surface tension on the time scale of the experiments. The reaction is a neutralization of a fatty acid by an alkaline material to form a surfactant, which exhibits first-order kinetics for the surface tension as a function of time. The experiments are carried out for capillary numbers, , the reactive fingering patterns are similar to the fingers with no reaction: the fractal dimension is found to be the same for both systems. These effects are consistent with the hypothesis that Marangoni stresses are present and produce wider fingers.

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