A thermodynamic limitation on the maximum speed of wetting of a solid surface by a liquid

A thermodynamic formulation is applied to examine the wetting process of a solid surface by a liquid. Attention is focused on the change of the Gibbs free energy of a given gas/liquid/solid system and the moving speed of the contact line on the solid surface. The present study demonstrates that there is a thermodynamic limitation on the wetting speed in a given system. This thermodynamic limitation leads to the verification of the postulate suggested by Blake and Ruschak [Nature (London) 282, 489 (1979)] that there is a maximum speed at which wetting can proceed for the given system.