Capillary Action

Domain	Definitions
Environment	Movement of water through very small spaces due to molecular forces called capillary forces. (references)
Geography	The phenomenon by which water or other liquids are carried by minute pores throughout the soil or upwards. Source: European Union. (references)
Hydrologic	The means by which liquid moves through the porous spaces in a solid, such as soil, plant roots, and the capillary blood vessels in our bodies due to the forces of adhesion, cohesion, and surface tension. Capillary action is essential in carrying substances and nutrients from one place to another in plants and animals. (references)
Mining	See:capillarity. (references)
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

Specialty Definition: Capillary action

Capillary action or capillarity is the ability of a narrow tube to draw a liquid upwards against the force of gravity. It occurs when the adhesive intermolecular forces between the liquid and a solid are stronger than the cohesive intermolecular forces within the liquid. The effect causes a concave meniscus to form where the liquid is in contact with a vertical surface. The same effect is what causes porous materials to soak up liquids.

A common apparatus used to demonstrate capillary action is the capillary tube. When the lower end of a vertical glass tube is placed in a liquid such as water, a concave meniscus forms. Surface tension pulls the liquid column up until there is a sufficient weight of liquid for gravitational forces to overcome the intermolecular forces. The weight of the liquid column is proportional to the square of the tube's diameter, but the contact area between the liquid and the tube is proportional only to the diameter of the tube, so a narrow tube will draw a liquid column higher than a wide tube. For example, a glass tube 0.1 mm in diameter will lift a 30 cm column of water.

With some pairs of materials, such as mercury and glass, the interatomic forces within the liquid exceed those between the solid and the liquid, so a convex meniscus forms and capillary action works in reverse.

A plant makes use of capillary action to draw liquid water into its system, although larger plants require transpiration to move a sufficient quantity of water to where it is required.

Formula

The height h in metres of a liquid column is given by:

where

T = interfacial surface tension (N/m)

θ = contact angle

ρ = density of liquid (kg/m³)

g = acceleration due to gravity (m/s²)

For a water-filled glass tube in air at sea level,

T = 0.0728 N/m at 20°C

θ = 20°

ρ = 1000 kg/m³

g = 9.80665 m/s²

and so the height of the liquid column is given by

Abbreviations & Acronyms: Capillary Action

The following table is compiled from various sources, across various languages. When English abbreviations or acronyms come from a non-English source, this is noted.
Entry	Source	Expression	Field
CAST	English	Capillary action shaping technique	Electrical Engineering, Engineering & Technology
Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references).

Frequency of Internet Keywords: Capillary Action

Modern Translations: Capillary Action

Language		Translations for "capillary action"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses.
Danish		kapillarbrydende lag (sealing course to prevent capillary action). (various references)

Dutch		capillariteit (capillarity). (various references)

French		capillarité (capillarity). (various references)

German		Kapillarität (capillarity). (various references)

Greek		τριχοειδήσ δράση, τριχοειδής ιδιότητα (capillarity). (various references)

Italian		capillarit� (capillarity). (various references)

Pig Latin		apillarycay actionay

Spanish		capilaridad (capillarity). (various references)

Swedish		kapillaritet (capillarity). (various references)
Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references.

Misspellings: Capillary Action

Anagrams: Capillary Action

Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams
	Words within the letters "a-a-a-c-c-i-i-l-l-n-o-p-r-t-y"
	-3 letters: cationically, narcotically, paranoically.
	-4 letters: actinically, capillarity, conciliarly, coplanarity, occipitally, parallactic, pictorially, piratically, plantocracy, practically.
	-5 letters: allopatric, analytical, antipiracy, apolitical, arctically, cortically, critically, iconically, incapacity, ironically, notarially, nyctalopia, palliation, polyclinic, rationally, tropically.
	Words containing the letters "a-a-a-c-c-i-i-l-l-n-o-p-r-t-y"
	+4 letters: cinematographically.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro.

Alternative Orthography: Capillary Action

Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)

43 61 70 69 6C 6C 61 72 79 41 63 74 69 6F 6E

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)

Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)

01000011 01100001 01110000 01101001 01101100 01101100 01100001 01110010 01111001 00100000 01000001 01100011 01110100 01101001 01101111 01101110

HTML Code (1990) (references)

&#67 &#97 &#112 &#105 &#108 &#108 &#97 &#114 &#121 &#32 &#65 &#99 &#116 &#105 &#111 &#110

ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)

0043 0061 0070 0069 006C 006C 0061 0072 0079 0041 0063 0074 0069 006F 006E

Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)

Capillary Action

Definition: Capillary Action