Coulomb fission event resolved progeny droplet production from isolated evaporating methanol droplets.

An electrodynamic balance was used to levitate a single methanol droplet while it evaporated down to, and just beyond, its first encountered Coulomb fission limit as ascertained by the time dependence of its laser light scatter signal. At its Coulomb limit, the primary droplet fragmented and approximately 81% of its net charge was released in the form of small droplets that are termed progeny. The window of time over which the progeny droplets were ejected from the electrodynamic balance was deltat = 850 ms, indicating that these droplets were formed with a range of mass-to-charge values. An average of 13.2 (+/-4.4) progeny droplets were detected as a result of this fragmentation event. On the assumption that the average initial radius of the progeny droplets were one-tenth the radius of the droplet undergoing the Coulomb fission event, approximately 50% of the total net charge ejected would not have been carried by the 13 progeny droplets detected.