On the Influence of Relative Humidity on the Contact Angle of a Water Droplet on a Silicon Wafer

Contact angle analysis of liquids on surfaces has been extensively used to evaluating solid surface free energy, surface tension, and surface wetting characteristics. Despite the great interest in the contact angle, reported measurements has shown a high variety, which is often related to different contact angle measurement techniques or substrate preparation and oxidation among others. In addition, it is well know, that surface tension and contact angle are modified with temperature. However, no attention has been paid to the influence of the relative humidity (RH) in surface tension or contact angle measurements. In a previous work, we have demonstrated that (for a constant temperature) surface tension on a suspended droplet decreases linearly with RH in the air. In this paper, contact angle of a water droplet on a silicon wafer surface is studied and its relationship with the relative humidity in the air investigated.