Approach to universality in axisymmetric bubble pinch-off.

The pinch-off of an axisymmetric air bubble surrounded by an inviscid fluid is compared in four physical realizations: (i) cavity collapse in the wake of an impacting disk, (ii) gas bubbles injected through a small orifice, (iii) bubble rupture in a straining flow, and (iv) a bubble with an initially necked shape. Our boundary-integral simulations suggest that all systems eventually follow the universal behavior characterized by slowly varying exponents predicted by J. Eggers [Phys. Rev. Lett. 98, 094502 (2007)]. However, the time scale for the onset of this final regime is found to vary by orders of magnitude depending on the system in question. While for the impacting disk it is well in the millisecond range, for the gas injection needle universal behavior sets in only a few microseconds before pinch-off. These findings reconcile the different views expressed in recent literature about the universal nature of bubble pinch-off.