Marangoni Flow of Soluble Amphiphiles

Surfactant distribution heterogeneities at a fluid-fluid interface trigger the Marangoni effect, i.e., a bulk flow due to a surface tension gradient. The influence of surfactant solubility in the bulk on these flows remains incompletely characterized. Here we study Marangoni flows sustained by injection of hydrosoluble surfactants at the air-water interface. We show that these flows have a finite size that increases with a decrease of the critical micelle concentration of the surfactants. We document the universality of the surface velocity field of these finite flows and predict scaling laws based on hydrodynamics and surfactant physical chemistry that capture the flow features.