Single glycerol/water microdroplets standing on a superhydrophobic surface: optical microcavities promising original applications

Abstract

Glycerol/water microdroplets take almost spherical shapes when standing on a superhydrophobic surface. Hence they are suitable to function as optical microcavities. Using Rhodamine B doped water microdroplets, large spectral tunability of the whispering gallery modes (WGMs) (>5 nm) was observed. Tunability was achieved by evaporation/condensation in a current controlled mini humidity chamber. Experiments revealed a mechanism stabilizing the volume of these microdroplets with femtoliter resolution. The mechanism relied on the interplay between the condensation rate that was kept constant and the size dependent laser induced heating. The radii of individual water microdroplets (>5 mu m) stayed within a few nanometers during long time periods (several minutes). By blocking the laser excitation for 500 msec, the stable volume of individual microdroplets were changed stepwise. Laser emission was also observed from Rhodamine B doped glycerol/water microdroplets using a pulsed, frequency-doubled Nd:YAG laser (lambda=532 nm) as the excitation source. The observed largely tunable WGMs and laser emission can pave way for novel applications in optical communication systems. Besides due to the sensitivity of the WGMs to the size and shape of the microdroplets, the results can find applications in characterizing superhydrophobic surfaces and investigating liquid-solid surfaces.