Self-assembly of spherical particles on an evaporating sessile droplet.

Particles adsorbed on the surface of a droplet form three-dimensional packings when the droplet evaporates. We study the final packings when the liquid droplet is attached to a solid substrate. In contrast to a droplet evaporating away from a substrate, here the final packings are highly dependent on both the number of particles and the contact angle between the droplet and the surface. Simple geometrical constraints quantitatively determine the parameter regions that particular packings can form.