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Scientists Discover Way to Send Information into Black Holes Without Using Energy

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Scientists Just Made Bigger Water Drops Defy Gravity. Here’s How

Droplets—tiny drops of water or other liquids—play an important role in many technologies. They help move mass, energy, momentum, and even electric charges across surfaces. This makes them useful in hydrogen production, surface cleaning, condensation cooling, energy harvesting, and 3D printing.

The problem is, droplet size affects how well they work. Small droplets are easy to make but carry only a little mass and energy. Large droplets can carry more, but gravity stops them from moving freely. For water droplets, there is a natural limit called the capillary length, about 2.7 mm. Above this size, droplets cannot jump on their own. This has been a major obstacle for using bigger droplets in technology.

Nature, however, has already solved this problem in its own way. Dew on plant leaves often contains hollow droplets with tiny bubbles inside. When these bubbles burst, the released energy can make the droplet jump, helping the leaf clean itself. Inspired by this, scientists have developed a bubble-burst strategy to make droplets jump. Using this method, even centimeter-sized puddles of water can leap off surfaces. This breaks the natural size limit and improves the efficiency of droplet-based processes.

Here’s how it works: when a bubble inside a droplet bursts, the thin bubble cap snaps back quickly, creating capillary waves that travel across the droplet surface. These waves hit the base of the droplet and push it upward. Unlike older methods, which move the whole droplet and waste energy, this method focuses energy on the droplet edges, reducing sideways spreading and sending the droplet straight up. Experiments on superhydrophobic surfaces (surfaces that repel water) show that even large puddles can jump this way without any external help.

Researchers from Virginia Tech and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, led by Wenge Huang, studied how these capillary waves work. They found that the waves travel at the same speed no matter the bubble size. The wave’s momentum grows linearly with bubble size, while the droplet jumping height increases quadratically. This means small changes in bubble size can make droplets jump much higher. They also created a phase map showing the best conditions for droplet jumping, giving a clear guide for experiments and applications.

The bubble-burst method also allows directional control. By tilting the surface, the bursting bubble can shoot liquid in a particular direction, which is very useful for 3D printing and additive manufacturing, where precise material placement is needed. Because the method works passively, it is also energy-efficient, unlike traditional techniques that require pumps or machines to move droplets.

This discovery has many practical uses. In surface cleaning, droplets can lift dirt and dust without scrubbing. In condensation cooling, larger droplets carry away heat more effectively, helping cool devices or power plants. For hydrogen production, better droplet movement can speed up chemical reactions. In energy harvesting, moving droplets can transfer charge more efficiently, boosting electricity generation.

Most importantly, this method overcomes the capillary length limit. By concentrating energy into the droplet edges, more than 90% of wave momentum is converted into droplet motion. This allows even heavy puddles to jump with minimal energy loss, making it practical for industrial use.

Researchers also studied how droplet jumping interacts with fluid jets. When bubbles burst near droplet edges, they can produce both upward motion and side jets, which can transport particles in a controlled way. This opens possibilities in microfluidics, chemical processing, and precise printing of materials. Understanding how capillary waves work on liquid surfaces also gives new insight into fluid-structure interactions, a field that studies how liquids and surfaces influence each other.

From a practical point of view, the bubble-burst method is simple. You need only a water-repelling surface and bubbles inside the droplet. By adjusting bubble size and droplet volume, you can control jumping height, direction, and momentum, making this method very flexible.

This research changes how we think about droplet behavior. Previous studies focused on small droplets, but now, centimeter-scale droplet jumping is possible. This allows much more efficient mass, energy, and momentum transfer. Applications in cleaning, cooling, energy, and manufacturing can benefit greatly from this technology.

In summary, bubble-burst-driven droplet jumping is a game-changer in fluid science. By creating localized capillary waves, droplets much larger than the traditional limit can jump, enabling faster and more efficient liquid transport. This innovation is likely to transform industrial processes, energy systems, and material manufacturing, making droplet-based technology more powerful than ever.

Reference: Huang, W., Lori, M.S., Yang, A. et al. Bubble-burst-induced Puddle Jumping and Jet Printing. Nat Commun 17, 1818 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-69512-y

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