Multicellular structures in thin free liquid films induced by thermocapillary effect.

The multicellular structure is established by the thermocapillary effect in the free liquid films. The cell number increases in a stepwise manner as the liquid-film width increases. When the cell number increases, another pair of the cells always newly emerges. We determine the wavelength in a non-dimensional manner, and present the variation of the wavelength against the aspect ratio corresponding to the liquid-film width. The results are compared to those of convectional Marangoni-Bénard convection.