Bubble growth was triggered in a capillary tube closed at one end and vented to the atmosphere at the other and initially filled with uniformly superheated water. Measurements of the rate of axial growth and the varying pressure at the closed end were used to test under these simplified conditions assumptions employed in one-dimensional models for bubble growth applicable to the more complex conditions of confined-bubble flow boiling in microchannels. Issues included the thickness of the liquid films round confined bubbles and changes in saturation temperature due to the changes in pressure generated by bubble motion. Modelling features requiring further attention were identified, such as the possibility of "roll-up" of the liquid film due to a large dynamic contact angle.

We have formulated a generalization of the energy boundary condition for fluid-fluid interfaces that includes the transport of the Gibbs excess internal energy. A newly measured surface property - the surface thermal capacity c(sigma) - appears in the result, and couples the temperature and velocity fields. If this term is not included in the energy boundary condition at liquid-vapor interfaces, the energy-conservation principle cannot be satisfied during steady-state evaporation of H(2)O(l) or D(2)O(l) . The c(sigma) term is possibly important in a number of other circumstances, and its importance can be determined from the magnitude of two nondimensional numbers.

The discovery of resistance switching memristors marks a paradigm shift in the search for alternative non-volatile memory components in the semiconductor industry. Normally a dielectric in these bistable memory cells changes its resistance with an applied electric field or current, albeit retaining the resistive state based on the history of the applied field. Despite showing immense potential, sustainable growth of this new memory technology is bogged down by several factors including cost, intricacies of design, lack of efficient tunability, and issues with scalability and eco-friendliness. Here, we demonstrate a simple arrangement wherein an ethanol-adsorbed ZnO thin film exhibits orders of magnitude change in resistance when activated by visible light. We show that there exists two stable ohmic states, one in the dark and the other in the illuminated regime, as well as a significant delay in the transition between these saturated states. We also demonstrate that visible light acts as a non-invasive tuning parameter for the bistable resistive states. Furthermore, a pinched hysteresis I-V response observed in these devices indicate what seems to be a new type of memristive behaviour.