Tuesday, August 04, 2020

Superhydrophobic surfaces toughen up

Amazing stuff! 

I hope these superhydrophobic surfaces will soon prevent eyeglasses from fogging up. Especially in times when face mask wearing is mandated to reduce Covid-19 infections, this fogging is a very frequent and annoying issue!

"As their name suggests, superhydrophobic [surfaces] repel water extremely well. They owe this impressive ability to a thin layer of air that develops around nanometer-scale structures on their surface. By ensuring that droplets barely touch the solid part of the surface at all, the air layer effectively acts as a lubricant, allowing water droplets to roll off with near-zero friction. ... 

These nanostructured surfaces are, however, mechanically fragile and can easily be wiped away. To address this drawback, a research team ... created a superhydrophobic surface containing structures at two different length scales: a nanoscale structure that is water repellent and a microscale one that provides durability.

The microstructure consists of an interconnected frame containing “pockets” of tiny inverted pyramids. Within these pyramids are the highly water-repellent and mechanically fragile nanostructures. ... The surfaces may even have antimicrobial properties since bacteria, viruses and pathogens cannot cling to the nanostructures."

Superhydrophobic surfaces toughen up – Physics World

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