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Wetting of quantum fluids: A route to free-standing shell-shaped quantum droplets

Francesco Ancilotto

  • Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia “Galileo Galilei” and CNISM, Università di Padova, via Marzolo 8, 35122 Padova, Italy

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Phys. Rev. A 114, 013317 – Published 20 July, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/lzmy-gwp3

Abstract

We investigate wetting phenomena between self-bound quantum fluids in a three-component Bose mixture of Na23, K39, and K41 atoms. Within a density-functional approach including mean-field interactions and Lee-Huang-Yang quantum-fluctuation corrections, we consider two binary quantum liquids formed by components (1, 2) and (2, 3) and study the adsorption of the softer (1, 2) liquid on a stiffer (2, 3) substrate. By tuning the interspecies scattering length a12, we show that the surface tension of the (1, 2) liquid can be strongly varied, driving a transition from partial wetting to complete wetting of the (2, 3) phase. The contact angle extracted from cylindrical-cap geometries decreases continuously with increasing a12 and vanishes near the critical value a12c=−42a0. In the complete-wetting regime, a finite amount of (1, 2) liquid wraps around a spherical (2, 3) droplet, producing a self-bound core-shell droplet without external confinement, whose component-1 density has a shell-like, hollow projection. We further show that such shell-shaped quantum droplets can sustain quantized vortical excitations. These results identify wetting as a route to engineering free-standing shell-shaped quantum liquids and suggest possibilities for studying capillarity, topology, and superfluidity in multicomponent quantum droplets.

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Phys. Rev. A 114, 013317– Published 20 July, 2026
  • Received 22 May 2026
  • Accepted 7 July 2026
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