Finally, it is now known why dew always collects at the tips of the leaves. The answer to this interesting question was given by Martin Shanahanu, a scientist from the University of Edinburgh (UK), who managed to accurately describe the model of strange behavior of dew, which forms precisely at the tips of the leaves, and not on their surface. The results of the experiment were published in the scientific journal Lanqmuir.

Drops, which form from water vapor in the air as the leaf surface cools in the morning and afternoon hours, accumulate in a random order throughout the entire plane. It has been noticed that dew tends to accumulate precisely at the ends of thin and long leaves, even when it is necessary to overcome the laws of gravity by moving upward.

Author’s abstraction

The British scientist noticed that raindrops behave somewhat differently – they always remain on the dry surface of the leaf in the place where they formed. Dew drops behave quite differently.

The solution to the mysterious behavior of the dew drops turned out to be quite simple. The whole “focus” lies in the fundamental principle of thermodynamic potential, that is, any physical body of nature strives to preserve the lowest energy potential of all possible energy states.

For the experiment, Martin Shanahanu used two droplet models on a primitive cone-shaped sheet. One of the models was shaped like a thin cylinder, while the other was a sphere. After that, the droplets were placed on the axis of the cone, and in both cases it was observed that the energy of the droplets decreased markedly as they approached the tip of the sheet.