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A liquid becomes a continuous fiber only when the spinning process stretches it faster than surface-tension-driven breakup can collapse it into droplets. The stretching force is process-specific: an electric field pulls a charged jet in electrospinning, while rotation drives liquid outward in centrifugal spinning. Gravity usually modifies the starting drop and jet path rather than supplying the main stretching force, but its effect can become visible when the apparatus is reoriented or the driving force is weak. Viscosity, polymer-chain entanglement, evaporation and temperature determine whether the stretched liquid remains a fiber long enough to solidify.
The force balance that makes a liquid fiber
Spinning starts with a liquid held at an orifice, needle or spinneret. The liquid surface has an energetic preference for less area, so surface tension pulls the exposed fluid toward a compact shape. A long, thin jet has far more surface area than a drop containing the same volume. Unless another force continually elongates the jet and the liquid has enough rheological resistance to delay breakup, small diameter variations grow until the thread separates into beads or droplets.
The process therefore has three interacting parts:
- Driving force: an electric field in electrospinning or centrifugal acceleration in centrifugal spinning supplies the outward or axial stretching work.
- Capillary force: surface tension reduces area and amplifies disturbances that favor Rayleigh–Plateau breakup.
- Rheological resistance: viscosity and polymer-chain entanglement dissipate motion and can hold a filament together while it thins and solidifies.
Gravity adds a body force to the pendant drop and the moving jet. It changes hydrostatic pressure and direction, but it is not interchangeable with the process force. Reviews of electrospinning and non-electro spinning describe these balances as method-specific rather than as one universal ranking of force magnitudes (electrospinning jet review; review of non-electro nanofibre spinning).
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One free scan finds every outdated or missing driver and matches the right update for your exact hardware.Free scan · exact hardware matchHow surface tension destabilizes a slender jet
Why a jet wants to become droplets
Surface tension acts along the liquid interface. If a cylindrical jet develops a slightly wider and narrower section, pressure differences across the curved surface tend to move liquid toward the wider section. The wide sections become larger and the narrow sections thinner. This capillary amplification is commonly called Rayleigh or Plateau–Rayleigh instability. Once a neck becomes sufficiently thin, it pinches off, leaving droplets or bead-like defects.
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The instability is not a statement that every high-surface-tension liquid instantly breaks. Breakup competes with stretching, viscous dissipation, viscoelastic stresses and the time available before solvent evaporation or cooling. A polymer solution can remain threadlike because long chains become entangled and resist rapid extensional thinning. A low-viscosity liquid with little molecular cohesion has less resistance and can fragment readily. Conversely, a very viscous or strongly entangled solution may resist the deformation needed to form a fine fiber.
Beads, droplets and a continuous filament
Three outcomes are useful for interpreting a process:
- Continuous fiber: stretching and material resistance suppress capillary pinch-off until the jet dries, cools or otherwise solidifies.
- Beaded fiber: the jet mostly travels as a filament, but capillary growth leaves periodic thicker sections.
- Droplets: breakup occurs before a stable solid or gelled filament forms.
It is therefore unsafe to infer fiber diameter from surface tension alone. Lowering surface tension may reduce the capillary pressure that drives breakup, but it also changes wetting, cone formation and the way the liquid responds to the process force. Raising surface tension can make initiation more difficult, yet the final morphology still depends on viscosity, concentration, chain entanglement, field or rotation, evaporation, temperature and collector distance. The role of rheology in morphology and processing is reviewed in this ACS Omega article.
Electrospinning: the electric field supplies the stretch
From pendant drop to charged jet
In electrospinning, a liquid droplet hangs from a spinneret while a high-voltage electric field is established between the spinneret and a collector. Charges accumulate at the liquid surface. As the field is increased, electrical stresses deform the drop into a Taylor cone. When the electrical pull overcomes the combination of surface tension and the liquid’s resistance to deformation, a charged jet leaves the cone.
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- Form the pendant drop: establish a steady flow at the spinneret so the drop is neither growing uncontrollably nor retreating into the needle.
- Charge and deform the surface: raise the electric field while watching the cone. Electrical stress reshapes the drop against capillary restoring stress.
- Initiate the jet: at a suitable operating point, a narrow charged filament emerges from the cone.
- Stretch and thin: electrical forces continue to draw the charged liquid, while viscosity and polymer elasticity resist rapid extension.
- Allow solidification: solvent evaporation, cooling or another phase change fixes the fiber before capillary breakup completes.
The jet does not simply become straighter as it travels. It can undergo axisymmetric diameter disturbances as well as non-axisymmetric bending and whipping. Those motions increase the path length and can produce very fine fibers, but excessive instability can broaden the deposited distribution or cause intermittent deposition. The interactions among electric stress, capillarity and polymer viscoelasticity are summarized in the review of electrospinning methods and applications.
Where gravity enters electrospinning
Gravity acts on the pendant drop before emission and on the jet after emission. Rotating or tilting the apparatus changes the direction of that force relative to the electric field, spinneret and collector. A review of empirical orientation studies reports that gravity is generally smaller than electrical forcing in electrospinning, yet orientation can still alter Taylor-cone shape, jet trajectory, fiber diameter and diameter distribution, and process efficiency (orientation and gravity review).
This means “gravity is negligible” is too broad. In a strongly driven, well-controlled setup, gravity may be a secondary correction to the electric force. Near jet initiation, with a large pendant drop, a long unsupported path or a weaker field, the same gravitational component can shift the cone or move the landing point enough to matter. The direction of the shift depends on the apparatus geometry, not on a universal rule that fibers always become thicker or thinner when the spinneret is inverted.
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Centrifugal spinning: rotation supplies the outward force
How a rotating spinneret ejects liquid
Centrifugal spinning, sometimes called rotary jet spinning, uses a rotating head, disk or reservoir with one or more orifices. Rotation creates an outward acceleration on the liquid. As rotational forcing rises, liquid is driven through the orifice and forms a jet that is stretched toward a collector. The centrifugal force must be sufficient to overcome surface tension at the outlet and the liquid’s resistance to flow.
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- Load the rotating head: fill the reservoir or spinneret with a solution whose viscosity and concentration allow it to pass through the orifice.
- Establish rotation: bring the head to a controlled speed rather than changing speed abruptly, which can create surges and uneven jets.
- Reach ejection: when outward forcing exceeds the capillary and flow-resistance barrier at the orifice, one or more jets emerge.
- Stretch during flight: the rotating geometry and collector distance provide the path over which the jet thins.
- Solidify and collect: evaporation, cooling or another setting mechanism must occur before the filament breaks or lands as a wet strand.
Increasing rotation is not an unlimited solution. A faster jet may stretch more, but it also experiences stronger disturbances and a shorter time in which an unstable filament can recover. Surface tension, viscosity, polymer concentration, evaporation rate, temperature and collector distance jointly determine whether the result is a continuous fiber, beads or droplets. The process distinctions are detailed in the RSC review of non-electro nanofibre spinning.
Gravity in a rotating system
Gravity changes the liquid level and hydrostatic pressure in the rotating head and can bias the initial direction of a jet relative to the collector. Once centrifugal acceleration is much larger than gravitational acceleration in the relevant direction, rotation dominates the trajectory. That does not erase gravity at the feed point: an asymmetric fill level, a tilted machine or a start-up transient can change which orifice wets first and whether jets are evenly distributed. Because the available reviews do not establish one common quantitative comparison across apparatuses, the correct description is setup-dependent rather than a fixed percentage contribution.
Why the same surface tension gives different results in the two methods
| Comparison axis | Electrospinning | Centrifugal spinning |
|---|---|---|
| Primary jet-driving force | Electrical stress on a charged pendant drop and jet | Outward centrifugal acceleration from a rotating head or disk |
| Initiation challenge | Electrical stress must deform the drop and overcome capillary restoring stress | Rotational forcing must push liquid through the orifice against surface tension and flow resistance |
| Typical jet instabilities | Axisymmetric breakup plus bending or whipping of a charged jet | Capillary breakup and trajectory disturbances from rotating ejection and flight |
| Gravity’s most visible effects | Pendant-drop shape, Taylor-cone orientation, jet path, deposited diameter and efficiency | Liquid level, wetting of orifices, initial jet direction and collector distribution |
| Material controls | Viscosity, polymer elasticity, chain entanglement, conductivity and solvent loss | Viscosity, concentration, chain entanglement, surface tension, evaporation, temperature and collector distance |
| Evidence for a universal force ranking | Not established; the cited reviews discuss method-specific interactions rather than one directly comparable dataset. | |
The table explains why a recipe that works in an electric field cannot be transferred to a rotating spinneret by changing only the speed or voltage. The same solution can have a different residence time, jet length, charge state and deformation history in each process.
Material properties decide whether stretching becomes a fiber
Viscosity and extensional resistance
Viscosity dissipates deformation and slows the growth of small necks. Extensional resistance is especially important because a spinning jet is pulled along its length, not merely sheared. If resistance is too low, capillary disturbances grow into beads or droplets. If resistance is too high, the liquid may not feed smoothly, the cone or orifice may become unstable, and the jet may fail to thin efficiently.
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Polymer concentration and chain entanglement
Polymer chains can overlap and entangle, giving the liquid an elastic memory that helps bridge a narrowing section. A dilute solution with insufficient entanglement may produce droplets even when its viscosity seems adequate. A highly concentrated solution can preserve a filament but may require more force to draw and may solidify differently. Concentration therefore affects both breakup resistance and the amount of stretching achievable before collection.
Evaporation, temperature and collector distance
A filament must become mechanically stable before capillary pinch-off finishes. Faster solvent loss or cooling can lock in a fiber sooner; slower solidification leaves a longer interval for beads and droplets to form. Temperature changes viscosity and evaporation simultaneously. Collector distance sets the available flight time: a longer path can permit more thinning and drying, but also gives instabilities more time to grow. These variables should be adjusted together rather than treated as independent surface-tension fixes.
Diagnosing what you see at the collector
Large droplets or spray
- Check whether the process force is high enough to sustain a jet rather than merely deforming the drop.
- Check viscosity, polymer concentration and chain entanglement; insufficient extensional resistance allows rapid pinch-off.
- Check whether the liquid is solidifying too slowly for the available flight distance.
Beads along otherwise continuous fibers
- Look for a capillary disturbance that grows during flight even though the jet remains connected.
- Review surface tension together with viscosity and concentration; changing only one variable can move the system into a different instability regime.
- Inspect flow or rotation for pulsation, because a changing feed creates diameter disturbances that surface tension can amplify.
Uneven deposition or diameter distribution
- In electrospinning, inspect apparatus orientation, cone shape and whipping direction; gravity can shift all three.
- In centrifugal spinning, inspect liquid distribution among orifices, head balance and collector alignment.
- Separate trajectory variation from true diameter change by examining both the landing pattern and the filament morphology.
No jet or intermittent jetting
- Confirm that the driving force reaches the drop or orifice consistently.
- Look for a surface-tension barrier that is too large for the selected field or rotational condition.
- Check feed rate, temperature and wetting at the spinneret; a changing pendant volume can repeatedly move the system across the ejection threshold.
A practical way to compare gravity and capillarity in an experiment
- Hold the liquid constant: use the same formulation, temperature and feed rate while comparing orientations or process forces.
- Change one geometry variable: rotate or tilt the apparatus without changing the collector distance, orifice size or electrical connections.
- Record initiation: document pendant-drop or cone shape, the onset of ejection and whether the jet is steady.
- Record the flight: photograph trajectory, whipping or jet count before interpreting the collected mat.
- Record morphology: distinguish continuous fibers, beads and droplets, and measure diameter distributions under the same imaging conditions.
- Repeat at several driving levels: a gravity effect that appears only near initiation should not be generalized to the entire operating range.
This design separates an orientation effect from a formulation effect. It also avoids claiming a universal numerical share for gravity when the relevant apparatus dimensions and force scales differ.
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Common misconceptions
“Surface tension alone determines fiber diameter.”
It does not. Surface tension sets a capillary tendency toward contraction and breakup, while the process force, viscosity, polymer elasticity, evaporation, temperature and flight time determine how far the jet stretches before it solidifies.
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“Higher surface tension always makes thicker fibers.”
Higher surface tension can resist initial deformation and intensify breakup once a disturbance develops, but the observed diameter depends on the entire force and rheology balance. A change in surface tension can also alter wetting and cone or orifice behavior.
“Gravity is irrelevant in electrospinning.”
Electrical forces commonly dominate the jet, yet orientation studies show measurable changes in cone shape, trajectory, diameter distribution and efficiency. Gravity is best treated as a secondary, geometry-dependent influence.
“Electrospinning and centrifugal spinning differ only in the machine.”
The driving physics differ at the point of ejection: one uses electrical stress on a charged liquid and the other uses rotation-induced outward acceleration. Their force balances, instability paths and useful operating adjustments therefore differ.
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What can and cannot be quantified universally
The cited reviews support a qualitative framework: surface tension promotes area reduction and breakup; electrical or centrifugal forcing supplies stretching; rheology can delay or suppress pinch-off; and gravity shifts the result according to orientation and geometry. They do not provide one consistently defined dataset that ranks gravity, surface tension and process force across all electrospinning and centrifugal-spinning systems. A numerical “percentage of force” for gravity or a universal breakup threshold would therefore be misleading without specifying the liquid, dimensions, orientation, operating conditions and measurement method.
For engineering decisions, use the framework to identify the dominant adjustable variable in your apparatus. If the drop will not emit, examine the initiation force and capillary barrier. If the jet emits but beads, examine extensional resistance, surface tension and solidification time. If the fibers land unevenly after tilting, examine gravity’s effect on trajectory and feed symmetry before changing the formulation. This keeps the explanation tied to the actual failure mode instead of treating every defect as a surface-tension problem.
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