Microcantilever sensors for monitoring the evaporation of microdrops of pure liquids and mixtures.

We describe in detail a nonimaging technique that allows the measurement of the mass, the radius, and the contact angle of evaporating sessile microdrops of pure liquids and binary mixtures. The microdrops were deposited onto hydrophobized silicon microcantilevers whose bending and resonance frequency were monitored during drop evaporation. We verify the laws of evaporation kinetics for microdrops with diameters from 80 down to 10 microm. The evaporation of mixtures of water/ethanol drops confirmed previous results with millimeter sized drops. N,N-dimethylformamide drops undergo a transformation from an initial spherical shape to a thin film. Flattening of the drop causes a slowdown of the evaporation kinetics at the end. Two concurring factors are at its origin: the rising disjoining pressure stabilizes the thin liquid film and the increasing radius of curvature of the drop reduces the vapor pressure.