  The dynamic interaction of complex fluid interfaces is highly sensitive to
near-contact interactions occurring at the scale of ten of nanometers. Such
interactions are difficult to analyse because they couple self-consistently to
the dynamic morphology of the evolving interface, as well as to the
hydrodynamics of the interstitial fluid film. In this work, we show that, above
a given magnitude threshold, near-contact interactions trigger non-trivial
micro-vorticity patterns, which in turn affect the effective near-contact
interactions, giving rise to persistent fluctuating ripples at the fluid
interface. In such regime, near-contact interactions may significantly affect
the macroscopic arrangement of emulsion configurations, such as those arising
in soft-flowing microfluidic crystals.
