Foaming agent Foaming agent A foaming agent is a material that facilitates formation of foam such as a surfactant or a blowing agent. A surfactant, when present in small amounts, reduces surface tension of a liquid (reduces the work needed to create the foam) or increases its colloidal stability by inhibiting coalescence of bubbles. A blowing agent is a gas that forms the gaseous part of the foam. Sodium laureth sulfate, or sodium lauryl ether sulfate (SLES), is a detergent and surfactant found in many personal care products (soaps, shampoos, toothpastes, etc.). It is an inexpensive and effective foamer. Sodium lauryl sulfate
Surface layering Stuart Rice at the University of Chicago in 1983 and has been experimentally discovered by Peter Pershan (Harvard) and his group, working in collaboration with Ben Ocko (Brookhaven) and Moshe Deutsch (Bar-Ilan) in 1995 in elemental liquid mercury and liquid gallium using x-ray reflectivity techniques. More recently layering has been shown to arise from electronic properties of metallic liquids, rather than thermodynamic variables such as surface tension, since surfaces of low-surface tension metallic liquids such as liquid potassium are layered, while those of dielectric liquids such as water, are not. Surface layering Surface layering is a quasi-crystalline structure at the