Temperature-Driven Precise Control of Biological Droplet’s Adhesion on a Slippery Surface

Abstract

Precise control of a biological droplet's adhesive force on a liquid-repellent surface for smart antifouling systems is critical and fundamental to scientific research and industrial applications. Although slippery surfaces with stimuli-responsive wetting behaviors have been reported, challenge still remains in designing responsive biological droplets to achieve controllable adhesion and antifouling property. Here, we developed a thermoresponsive biological droplet adhesion system to precisely control its adhesion on the lubricant-infused slippery surface. Single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) in the biological droplet displays molecular configuration reversible deformation under external thermal stimuli. This property ascribes to the changing amount of exposed hydrophobic moieties of ssDNA, which strongly affects the interfacial hydrophobic interaction with the lubricant. This work may improve the understanding of the principles underlying liquid−lubricant interfacial adhesion, open up opportunities for a new class of antifouling systems, and provide a promising system for controllable manipulation of liquids' motion in biochips and microreactor devices.

A Review of Smart Lubricant-Infused Surfaces for Droplet Manipulation

“…Wang et al found chain configuration of the single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) can reversibly deform in response to the temperature [67]. This chain deformation has an impact on the exposure of hydrophobic moieties on the ssDNA chain, which strongly affects the interfacial hydrophobic interaction with the lubricant.…”

External Stimuli Responsive Liquid‐Infused Surfaces Switching between Slippery and Nonslippery States: Fabrications and Applications

“…As a result, the motion behavior of RCA droplet changed from pinning to sliding on a tilted LIS. Reproduced with permission . Copyright 2019, American Chemical Society.…”

“…In our experiment, through analyzing the critical SA response to the various ATP concentrations, the detection limit of ATP could realize 5 × 10 −3 m. Based on this research, more recently, our group demonstrated that RCA biological droplet containing ssDNA displayed thermoresponsive wettability on LIS. [80] The ssDNA experienced reversible molecular configuration deformation when environmental temperature changed from 10 to 30 °C, leading to the reduced exposed hydrophobic moieties and weak interfacial adhesion. As a result, the biological droplet slid easily at higher temperature, as shown in Figure 7d.…”

Bioinspired Slippery Lubricant-Infused Surfaces With External Stimuli Responsive Wettability: A Mini Review

“…(C) Magnetic field responsive SLIS (Huang et al, 2017), Copyright 2017, WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA. (D) Temperature responsive SLIS (Wang et al, 2019). Copyright 2019, ACS.…”

“…Their biosensing applications for ATP, microRNA, and thrombin detection are also demonstrated. Based on this research, very recently, we (Wang et al, 2019) put forward a temperature responsive interfacial adhesion on SLIS. When environmental temperature increased, ssDNA became more flexible and more mobile.…”