Inkjet printing has been considered an available way to achieve large size full-color RGB quantum dots LED display, and the key point is to obtain printed film with uniform and flat surface profile. In this work, mixed solvent of 20 vol % 1,2-dichlorobenzene (oDCB) with cyclohexylbenzene (CHB) was used to dissolve green quantum dots (QDs) with CdSe@ZnS/ZnS core/shell structure. Then, by inkjet printing, a flat dotlike QDs film without the coffee ring was successfully obtained on polyetherimide (PEI)-modified ZnO layer, and the printed dots array exhibited great stability and repeatability. Here, adding oDCB into CHB solutions was used to reduce surface tension, and employing ZnO nanoparticle layer with PEI-modified was used to increase the surface free energy. As a result, a small contact angle is formed, which leads to the enhancement of evaporation rate, and then the coffee ring effect was suppressed. The printed dots with flat surface profile were eventually realized. Moreover, inverted green QD-LEDs with PEI-modified ZnO film as electron transport layer (ETL) and printed green QDs film as emission layer were successfully fabricated. The QD-LEDs exhibited the maximum luminance of 12 000 cd/m and the peak current efficiency of 4.5 cd/A at luminance of 1500 cd/m.

Preventing icing on exposed surfaces is important for life and technology. While suppressing ice nucleation by surface structuring and local confinement is highly desirable and yet to be achieved, a realistic roadmap of icephobicity is to live with ice, but with lowest possible ice adhesion. According to fracture mechanics, the key to lower ice adhesion is to maximize crack driving forces at the ice-substrate interface. Herein, we present a novel integrated macro-crack initiator mechanism combining nano-crack and micro-crack initiators, and demonstrate a new approach to designing super-low ice adhesion surfaces by introducing sub-structures into smooth polydimethylsiloxane coatings. Our design promotes the initiation of macro-cracks and enables the reduction of ice adhesion by at least ∼50% regardless of the curing temperature, weight ratio and size of internal holes, reaching a lowest ice adhesion of 5.7 kPa. The multiscale crack initiator mechanisms provide an unprecedented and versatile strategy towards designing super-low ice adhesion surfaces.

Ice accretion presents a severe risk for human safety. Although great efforts have been made for developing icephobic surfaces (the surface with an ice adhesion strength below 100 kPa), expanding the lifetime of state-of-the-art icephobic surfaces still remains a critical unsolved issue. Herein, a novel icephobic material is designed by integrating an interpenetrating polymer network (IPN) into an autonomous self-healing elastomer, which is applied in anti-icing for enhancing the mechanical durability. The molecular structure, surface morphology, mechanical properties, and durable icephobicity of the material were studied. The creep behaviors of the new icephobic material, which were absent in most relevant studies on self-healing materials, were also investigated in this work. Significantly, the material showed great potentials for anti-icing applications with an ultralow ice adhesion strength of 6.0 ± 0.9 kPa, outperforming many other icephobic surfaces. The material also exhibited an extraordinary durability, showing a very low long-term ice adhesion strength of ∼12.2 kPa after 50 icing/deicing cycles. Most importantly, the material was able to exhibit a self-healing property from mechanical damages in a sufficiently short time, which shed light on the longevity of icephobic surfaces in practical applications.

The mitigation of ice on exposed surfaces is of great importance to many aspects of life. Ice accretion, however, is unavoidable as time elapses and temperature lowers sufficiently. One practical solution is to reduce the ice adhesion strength on a surface to as low as possible, by either decreasing the substrate elastic modulus, lowering surface energy or increasing the length of cracks at the ice-solid interface. Herein, we present a facile preparation of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) based sandwich-like sponges with super-low ice adhesion. The weight ratio of the PDMS prepolymer to the curing agent is tuned to a lower surface energy and elastic modulus. The introduction of PDMS sponge structures combined the advantages of both a reduced apparent elastic modulus and most importantly, the macroscopic crack initiators at the ice-solid interface, resulting in dramatic reduction of the ice adhesion strength. Our design of sandwich-like sponges achieved a low ice adhesion strength as low as 0.9 kPa for pure PDMS materials without any additives. The super-low ice adhesion strength remains constant after 25 icing and deicing cycles. We thus provide a new and low-cost approach to realize durable super-low ice adhesion surfaces.