A simple way to achieve bioinspired hybrid wettability surface with micro/nanopatterns for efficient fog collection

Abstract

Fog collection is receiving increasing attention for providing water in semi-arid deserts and inland areas. Inspired by the fog harvesting ability of the hydrophobic-hydrophilic surface of Namib desert beetles, we present a simple, low-cost method to prepare a hybrid superhydrophobic-hydrophilic surface. The surface contains micro/nanopatterns, and is prepared by incorporating femtosecond-laser fabricated polytetrafluoroethylene nanoparticles deposited on superhydrophobic copper mesh with a pristine hydrophilic copper sheet. The as-prepared surface exhibits enhanced fog collection efficiency compared with uniform (super)hydrophobic or (super)hydrophilic surfaces. This enhancement can be tuned by controlling the mesh number, inclination angle, and fabrication structure. Moreover, the surface shows excellent anti-corrosion ability after immersing in 1 M HCl, 1 M NaOH, and 10 wt% NaCl solutions for 2 hours. This work may provide insight into fabricating hybrid superhydrophobic-hydrophilic surfaces for efficient atmospheric water collection.

Cylindrically Focused Nonablative Femtosecond Laser Processing of Long‐Range Uniform Periodic Surface Structures with Tunable Diffraction Efficiency

“…However, these techniques have certain limitations, such as high cost, requirement of complex systems like masks and vacuums, and lack of flexibility. The formation of laser‐induced periodic surface structures (LIPSS), which is first observed by Birnbaum in 1965, provides a mask‐free, nonvacuum, and low‐cost processing procedure for fabricating periodic structures on sample surfaces and exhibits powerful potential in various applications . After decades of research, multiple works have focused on LIPSS formation on a diverse range of materials .…”

Paradigms for biologically inspired design

“…Parker and Lawrence identified potential applications in the form of water-trapping tent and building covering or portable water-extractors (step 5). A prototype has recently been produced by depositing superhydrophobic nano-particles in a mesh placed on a hydrophilic copper sheet 44 . The prototype was shown to be an efficient method of fog collection with excellent anti-corrosion ability (step 6 and 7).…”

Co(OH)2 Nanosheets Supported on Laser Ablated Cu Foam: An Efficient Oxygen Evolution Reaction Electrocatalyst

“…The copper foam was purchased from Kunshan Metal Material Tech., Suzhou, China. The typical line-by-line femtosecond laser irradiation procedure is applied to modify the Cu foam, where detailed information can be found in previous work (Yin et al, 2017b;Duan et al, 2018). In particular, a high-repetition femtosecond laser system (PHAROS, LIGHT CONVERSION, Lithuania) that generates 250 fs pulses at a repetition rate of 75 kHz with a central wavelength of 1,030 nm is employed to fabricate micro/nano structures on the Cu foam surface.…”