Effect of oxygen
Surface tension of liquid metals and capillarity

Oxygen is a common impurity in furnaces used in metal production and processing. This element is important in metallurgical processes involving capillarity, as it is capable of reducing the surface energy of a liquid metal by several percent, and even tens of percent, even when present in the furnace atmosphere at very low partial pressure values P_O2.

In the general case, the interaction between the oxygen contained in the furnace atmosphere and a liquid metal M consists of a simple dissolution of the oxygen in the liquid: