ABSTRACT
It is also well known that the molecules situated near or at the interface (i.e., liquid-gas) are situated differently with respect to each other than are the molecules in the bulk phase. The intramolecular forces acting would thus be different in these two cases. Furthermore, it has been pointed out that, for a dense fluid, the repulsive forces dominate the fluid structure and are of primary importance. The main effect of the repulsive forces is to provide a uniform background potential in which the molecules move as hard spheres. The molecules at the interface would be under an asymmetric force field, which gives rise to the so-called surface tension or interfacial tension (Figure 1.1).
