Maximizing friction by liquid flow clogging in confinement

In the nanoscale regime, flow behaviors for liquids show qualitative deviations from bulk expectations. In this work, we reveal by molecular dynamics simulations that plug flow down to nanoscale induces molecular friction that leads to a new flow structure due to the molecular clogging of the encaged liquid. This plug-like nanoscale liquid flow shows several features differ from the macroscopic plug flow and Poiseuille flow: It leads to enhanced liquid/solid friction, producing a friction of several order of magnitude larger than that of Couette flow; the friction enhancement is sensitively dependent of the liquid column length and the wettability of the solid substrates; it leads to the local compaction of liquid molecules that may induce solidification phenomenon for a long liquid column. Graphical abstract