Kaye effect

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The Kaye Effect is a strange property of complex liquids which was first described by the British engineer Arthur Kaye in 1963.

While pouring one viscous mixture of an organic liquid onto a surface, the surface suddenly spouted an upcoming jet of liquid which merged with the downgoing one.

This phenomenon has since been discovered to be common in all thixotropic liquids (liquids which thin under shear stress). Common household liquids with this property are liquid hand soaps, shampoos and non-drip paint. The effect usually goes unnoticed however, because it seldom lasts more than about 300 milliseconds.

[edit] External links

• "Puzzle of leaping liquid solved; Physicists explain how shampoo streams can bounce", news@nature.com, April 6, 2006
• "Video for above".
• "Another Video for the above"
• "The Kaye effect shot through a high speed camera".
• "Leaping shampoo and the stable Kaye effect", M. Versluis, C. Blom, D. van der Meer, K. van der Weele and D. Lohse, University of Twente, The Netherlands.