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Droplets impacting solid superhydrophobic surfaces is appealing not only because of scientific interests but also for technological applications such as water-repelling. Recent studies have designed artificial surfaces in a rigid–flexible hybrid mode to combine asymmetric redistribution and structural oscillation water-repelling principles, resolving strict impacting positioning; however, this is limited by weak mechanical durability. Here we propose a rigid–flexible hybrid surface (RFS) design as a matrix of concave flexible trampolines barred by convex rigid stripes. Such a surface exhibits a 20.1% contact time reduction via the structural oscillation of flexible trampolines, and even to break through the theoretical inertial-capillary limit via the asymmetric redistribution induced by rigid stripes. Moreover, the surface is shown to retain the above water-repelling after 1,000 abrasion cycles against oilstones under a normal load as high as 0.2 N·mm−1. This is the first demonstration of RFSs for synchronous waterproof and wearproof, approaching real-world applications of liquid-repelling.


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Rigid–flexible hybrid surfaces for water-repelling and abrasion-resisting

Show Author's information Songtao HU1Weifeng HUANG2Jinbang LI3Tom REDDYHOFF4Xiaobao CAO5Xi SHI1( )Zhike PENG1,6Andrew DEMELLO5Daniele DINI4
State Key Laboratory of Mechanical System and Vibration, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China
State Key Laboratory of Tribology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
School of Mechanical Engineering and Mechanics, Ningbo University, Ningbo 315211, China
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, UK
Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences, ETH Zurich, Zurich 8093, Switzerland
School of Mechanical Engineering, Ningxia University, Yinchuan 750021, China

Abstract

Droplets impacting solid superhydrophobic surfaces is appealing not only because of scientific interests but also for technological applications such as water-repelling. Recent studies have designed artificial surfaces in a rigid–flexible hybrid mode to combine asymmetric redistribution and structural oscillation water-repelling principles, resolving strict impacting positioning; however, this is limited by weak mechanical durability. Here we propose a rigid–flexible hybrid surface (RFS) design as a matrix of concave flexible trampolines barred by convex rigid stripes. Such a surface exhibits a 20.1% contact time reduction via the structural oscillation of flexible trampolines, and even to break through the theoretical inertial-capillary limit via the asymmetric redistribution induced by rigid stripes. Moreover, the surface is shown to retain the above water-repelling after 1,000 abrasion cycles against oilstones under a normal load as high as 0.2 N·mm−1. This is the first demonstration of RFSs for synchronous waterproof and wearproof, approaching real-world applications of liquid-repelling.

Keywords: droplet impact, surface, abrasion, hydrophobic

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Publication history

Received: 29 September 2021
Revised: 23 November 2021
Accepted: 08 April 2022
Published: 10 August 2022
Issue date: April 2023

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© The author(s) 2022.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (12002202), Young Elite Scientist Sponsorship Program by the China Association for Science and Technology (YESS20200403), and State Key Laboratory of Mechanical System and Vibration (MSVZD202104).

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