Rupture of thin micropolar liquid film on a cylinder

The dynamic rupture process of a thin liquid film on a cylinder has been an alyzed by investigating the stability to finite amplitude disturbances. The dynamics of the liquid film is formulated using the balance equations incl uding a body force term due to van der Waals attractions. The governing equ ation for the film thickness was solved by finite difference method as part of an initial value problem for spatial periodic boundary conditions. A de crease in the cylinder radius will induce a stronger lateral capillary forc e and thus will accelerate the rupture process. The rupture time increases with the material parameter, Delta.