Technologies to harvest electrical energy from wind have vast potentials because wind is one of the cleanest and most sustainable energy sources that nature provides. Here we propose a flutter-driven triboelectric generator that uses contact electrification caused by the selfsustained oscillation of flags. We study the coupled interaction between a fluttering flexible flag and a rigid plate. In doing so, we find three distinct contact modes: single, double and chaotic. The flutter-driven triboelectric generator having small dimensions of 7.5 Â 5 cm at wind speed of 15 ms À 1 exhibits high-electrical performances: an instantaneous output voltage of 200 V and a current of 60 mA with a high frequency of 158 Hz, giving an average power density of approximately 0.86 mW. The flutter-driven triboelectric generation is a promising technology to drive electric devices in the outdoor environments in a sustainable manner.

Jumping on water is a unique locomotion mode found in semi-aquatic arthropods, such as water striders. To reproduce this feat in a surface tension-dominant jumping robot, we elucidated the hydrodynamics involved and applied them to develop a bio-inspired impulsive mechanism that maximizes momentum transfer to water. We found that water striders rotate the curved tips of their legs inward at a relatively low descending velocity with a force just below that required to break the water surface (144 millinewtons/meter). We built a 68-milligram at-scale jumping robotic insect and verified that it jumps on water with maximum momentum transfer. The results suggest an understanding of the hydrodynamic phenomena used by semi-aquatic arthropods during water jumping and prescribe a method for reproducing these capabilities in artificial systems.

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Harvesting water from humid air via dewing can provide a viable solution to a water shortage problem where liquid-phase water is not available. Here we experimentally quantify the effects of wettability and geometry of the condensation substrate on the water harvest efficiency. Uniformly hydrophilic surfaces are found to exhibit higher rates of water condensation and collection than surfaces with lower wettability. This is in contrast to a fog basking method where the most efficient surface consists of hydrophilic islands surrounded by hydrophobic background. A thin drainage path in the lower portion of the condensation substrate is revealed to greatly enhance the water collection efficiency. The optimal surface conditions found in this work can be used to design a practical device that harvests water as its biological counterpart, a green tree frog, Litoria caerulea , does during the dry season in tropical northern Australia.

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We consider the equilibrium flotation of a two-dimensional cylinder and a sphere at an interface between two fluids. We give conditions on the density and radius of these objects for them to be able to float at the interface and discuss the role played by the contact angle in determining these conditions. For cylinders with a small radius, we find that the maximum density is independent of contact angle but that, for spheres, the contact angle enters at leading order in the particle radius. Our theoretical predictions are in agreement with experimental results.

When a water drop hits a superhydrophobic solid surface, it bounces off the substrate like an elastic ball. Here we show that when a tiny superhydophobic solid sphere impacts with water, it can bounce off the free surface just as it impacts with an elastic membrane. The motion of a sinking sphere is analytically calculated by solving a potential flow whose free boundary is determined by the Young-Laplace equation. To find conditions under which the solid sphere should sink, bounce off, or oscillate upon impact with water, we construct simple scaling laws which are shown to agree well with experimentally found boundaries between the distinct impact behaviors in a regime map based on dimensionless parameters.

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