Solidlike spreading of a liquid/liquid system

The authors report an investigation of spreading of a polydimethylsiloxane oil drop on the surface of solution with very low Triton X-100 concentration. The spreading rate is found to be extremely lower than expected from the current theory. The spreading consists of two stages: the first stage has a precursor film formed which dissipates the redundant surface free energy and is responsible for the slow down of spreading rate as in the case of spreading on a solid surface, and the second stage is a normal spreading process on the liquid surface.