What about another liquid? Is there a "perfect" cleaner, something that spreads and penetrates like nothing else?
Very interested in the answer.
So could we produce a surface tension-free water?
Homie dats a gas. Or supercritical fluid, which actually is indeed used for "washing" (SC CO2 is used to decaffeinate coffee). However, like others said, surface tension /= cleaning ability. Part of what soap does is increase the effective solubility of things that are not normally soluble.
- You seem to be assuming that a perfectly tensionless water would make for a superior cleaner, but there’s no reason to assume that would be true. Lowering surface tension is not the sole reason that soap is a good cleaner; it’s not even the biggest reason.
- I have no idea if water can be made perfectly tensionless, but that’s what dishwasher rinse-aids are for: to make the water molecules stick to things (including each other) less, so they evaporate more quickly & easily. If You Want Drier Dishes, Use Dishwasher Rinse Aid
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Edit to add: I suppose that definitionally no liquid is without surface tension.A liquid is made up of tiny vibrating particles of matter, such as atoms, held together by intermolecular bonds. Like a gas, a liquid is able to flow and take the shape of a container. Unlike a gas, a liquid maintains a fairly constant density and does not disperse to fill every space of a container.
soap allows to dissolve fats in small droplets of soap (micelles). Surface tension arises from affinity to the surface, like oil still doesn't like teflon pans, despite being hydrophobic. So no, you can't find one size fits all liquid. (Aside from supercritical fluids, but they require pressures - and sometimes are used in dry cleaning! so this might be your answer)
The chemical properties that create surface tension help water become a great solvent for a variety of chemicals. There isn't a chemical that wouldn't have surface tension that would also be as good a solvent in that class of materials.
