Figure 1

Bubble disconnection dynamics. (a) Experiment: an air bubble (dark area) is submerged under water and released from a nozzle. Bright spots are optical artifacts. (b) When the bubble is released by a sudden burst of gas pressure from a slot, the initial ribbonlike neck disconnects via a “puncture,” instead of breaking at a point. There is a circular “hole” of water (light area) inside the ribbon-shaped bubble neck (dark area). A satellite bubble (dark dot) is visible in the water-filled hole. See 6 for details. (c) Model: A cross section of the neck (bubble region) contracts inwards due to a radially symmetric influx of water from the far field in the exterior.Reuse & Permissions

Figure 2

Time evolution of a slightly asymmetric neck cross section. The initial distortion is a single $n=2$ vibrational mode ($A_2/R_0=0.004$, ${\Omega }_2=\pi /4$). (a) The average radius $\overline{R}$, rescaled by the initial average radius $R_0$, as a function of $(t_{*}-t)/t_{*}$, the amount of time remaining until the point implosion singularity at $t_{*}$. (b) Neck cross section at successive times. Shapes rescaled by the average radius $\overline{R}(t)$. (c) Shape evolution when $n=2$ linear stability dynamics is extrapolated as a series expansion in $\mathcal{R}$, $\mathcal{V}$ variables down to contact [Eqn. (8)].Reuse & Permissions

Figure 3

Velocity at the contact location, $U_c/(d\overline{R}/dt)$, as a function of the gap width $d/R_0$. Simulation results for $A_2/R_0=0.004$ (circles), 0.011 (crosses), and 0.067 (triangles) with the same ${\Omega }_2=\pi /4$ display the same qualitative behavior but terminate with different $U_c$ values. The dot-dashed line is prediction from Eqn. (9) with $A_2/R_0=0.004$ (circles).Reuse & Permissions

Figure 4

Average radius ${\overline{R}}_c/R_0$ at the moment of contact as a function of the initial distortion amplitude $A_2/R_0$. The gap in the numerical result corresponds to initial conditions that evolve into more complicated forms of self-intersection.Reuse & Permissions