Liquid foams are gas-liquid dispersions with flexible structures that provide high gas-liquid interfaces. This property nominates liquid foams as excellent gas-liquid contactors, systems that are widely used in the chemical and biochemical industries. However, challenges such as a lack of comprehensive understanding and foam instability have historically hindered their widespread industrial use in most applications. It was not until the recent development of nanofluidics, nanotechnology, surface science, and other related fields that the understanding, analysis, and control of foam phenomena improved. This led to the development of innovative stabilization techniques and foam-based unit operations in chemical and biochemical processes, each of which requires in-depth and exclusive reviews to fully comprehend their potential and limitations and to identify areas for further improvement and innovation. This paper reviews the foams, the common phenomena in them, the characteristics that make them suitable for chemical/biochemical engineering, reports on their current applications and recent developments in this field.

中文翻译：

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液体泡沫：特性、结构、普遍现象及其在化学/生化过程中的应用

液体泡沫是具有柔性结构的气液分散体，可提供高气液界面。这一特性使液体泡沫成为优异的气液接触器和广泛应用于化学和生物化学工业的系统。然而，缺乏全面的了解和泡沫不稳定等挑战历来阻碍了它们在大多数应用中的广泛工业应用。直到最近纳米流体、纳米技术、表面科学和其他相关领域的发展，人们对泡沫现象的理解、分析和控制才得到改善。这导致了化学和生化过程中创新稳定技术和基于泡沫的单元操作的发展，每一项都需要进行深入和独家的审查，以充分理解其潜力和局限性，并确定需要进一步改进和创新的领域。本文综述了泡沫、泡沫的常见现象、使其适用于化学/生化工程的特性，报告了泡沫的当前应用和该领域的最新发展。