Design and construction of a Laplace and wettability gradient field for efficient water collection.

A hydrophilic-hydrophobic hybrid surface with a vein-like pattern was prepared on a copper substrate using 3D printing technology and laser scanning technology. Under the action of the Laplace pressure gradient and wettability gradient, the superhydrophilic (SHL) vein-like pattern on the superhydrophobic (SHB) surface aided the directional transport of water droplets. The presented scheme combined with the wettability and surface pattern could achieve a water-collection efficiency of 4258.

Mussel-Inspired Robust Peony-like Cu(PO) Composite Switchable Superhydrophobic Surfaces for Bidirectional Efficient Oil/Water Separation.

To alleviate the economic and environmental damage caused by industrial discharges of oily wastewater, materials applied for efficient oil/water separation are receiving significant attention from researchers and engineers. Among others, switchable wettable materials for bidirectional oil/water separation show great potential for practical applications. Inspired by mussels, we utilized a simple immersion method to construct a polydopamine (PDA) coating on a peony-like copper phosphate surface.

Tinware-Inspired Aerobic Surface-Initiated Controlled Radical Polymerization (SI-SnCRP) for Biocompatible Surface Engineering.

Surface anchored polymer brushes prepared by surface-initiated controlled radical polymerization (SI-CRP) have raised considerable interest in biomaterials and bioengineering. However, undesired residues of noxious transition metal catalysts critically restrain their widespread biomedical applications. Herein, we present a robust and biocompatible surface-initiated controlled radical polymerization catalyzed by a Sn(0) sheet (SI-SnCRP) under ambient conditions.

Transport and collection of water droplets interacting with bioinspired fibers.

Inspired by natural creatures, such as spider silk, scientists have designed various bionic materials with special wettability. Compared with two-dimensional and three-dimensional materials, one-dimensional materials, such as fiber, with special wettability can dynamically transport or manipulate liquid droplets, attracting widespread attention. This paper reviews the latest developments of bioinspired fibers in the directional steering and transportation of droplets.

Bioinspired surfaces with special micro-structures and wettability for drag reduction: which surface design will be a better choice?

Human beings learn from creatures in nature and imitate them to solve challenges in daily life. Thus, the use of bioinspired surfaces for drag reduction has attracted extensive attention in recent years due to their important applications in many fields, such as pipeline systems, maritime transportation, and military weapons. Herein, we introduce some typical plants and animals with low drag surfaces that exist in nature, focusing on their drag reduction patterns.

New insights into unusual droplets: from mediating the wettability to manipulating the locomotion modes.

The ability to manipulate droplets can be utilized to develop various smart sensors or actuators, endowing them with fascinating applications for drug delivery, detection of target analytes, environmental monitoring, intelligent control, and so on. However, the stimuli-responsive superhydrophobic/superhydrophilic materials for normal water droplets cannot satisfy the requirements from some certain circumstances, i.e.

Integration of bubble phobicity, gas sensing and friction alleviation into a versatile MoS/SnO/CNF heterostructure by an impressive, simple and effective method.

The engineering of composite surfaces and interfaces of materials at the micro/nano-hierarchical level with multiple functionalities is attracting increasing attention due to their biomimetic technological applications, especially the self-cleaning with gas bubbles, gas sensing and sustainable anti-friction performances. Herein, the ternary MoS/SnO/CNF (CNF: carbon nanofiber) was designed and assembled by an in situ facile method. Interestingly, its microstructure exhibits a necklace-like morphology.

Bionic smart recycled paper endowed with amphiphobic, photochromic, and UV rewritable properties.

The single-use of large volumes of paper has become a serious issue which is depleting our resources and damaging the environment. It is of great significance and challenging to adopt simple, reasonable and practical methods to prepare functional recyclable paper. In this article, inspired by pleochromatic creatures and plant leaves' special wettability, a series of photochromic amphiphobic recycled paper (PAR ) products was successfully prepared by adding gourd-like modified tungsten trioxide (MTT) to waste paper pulp.

The highly-efficient light-emitting diodes based on transition metal dichalcogenides: from architecture to performance.

Transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs) with layered architecture and excellent optoelectronic properties have been a hot spot for light-emitting diodes (LED). However, the light-emitting efficiency of TMDC LEDs is still low due to the large size limit of TMDC flakes and the inefficient device architecture. First and foremost, to develop the highly-efficient and reliable few-layer TMDC LEDs, the modulation of the electronic properties of TMDCs and TMDC heterostructures is necessary.

Characteristics of binary WO@CuO and ternary WO@PDA@CuO based on impressive sensing acetone odor.

A series of biomimetic electronic nose nanomaterials of WO, WO@PDA, WO@PDA@CuO, WO@CuO and CuO were prepared by a facile method and their microstructures, surface chemical composition and sensing ability for acetone odor were investigated systematically by a variety of technologies. The WO@PDA@CuO and WO@CuO particles are in nano-sized shape, about 20 nm. The sensing ability to different concentrations acetone odor (50, 100 and 200 ppm) is addressed.

Stable Janus superhydrophilic/hydrophobic nickel foam for directional water transport.

Janus superhydrophilic/hydrophobic macroporous nickel foam for directional water transport has been demonstrated via a simple floating strategy. Water can transport from hydrophobic to superhydrophilic layer through Janus nickel foam, but cannot transfer from superhydrophilic to hydrophobic layer. This "3D water diode" Janus nickel foam shows extremely high transport rate and outstanding stability.

Bio-inspired one-pot route to prepare robust and repairable micro-nanoscale superhydrophobic coatings.

Superhydrophobic (SHP) coatings inspired by lotus have great application prospect for our daily life. Regrettably, three formidable challenges, namely, complex fabrication, weak mechanical stability and large-scale fabrication, have already existed for a long time in this research field. Here, a robust micro-nanoscale P25 (Nano TiO)/MgO/epoxy resin (ER) SHP coating has been fabricated via facile one-pot route, which can be applied to arbitrary substrates through multiples methods.

Green fabrication of coloured superhydrophobic paper from native cotton cellulose.

Paper is kind of essential materials in our daily life. However, it can be easily destroyed by water owing to its superhydrophilic surface. Here, we reported a simple and green fabrication of coloured superhydrophobic paper via swelling and approximate dissolution of cotton followed by precipitation of cellulose and doping coloured stearates.

High-efficiency water collection on biomimetic material with superwettable patterns.

A superhydrophilic surface with two superhydrophobic circular patterns was fabricated via a simple and rapid route, showing outstanding fog harvesting properties with a water collection rate (WCR) of 1316.9 mg h cm. Water collection can be repeated on the sample 10 times without obvious change in the WCR.

Hybrid MWCNTs membrane with well-tunable wettability.

With the development of surface science, surface with special wettability, such as reversible or gradient, gradually becomes the focus of the field of science now. Here, via a facile, green organic solvent-free route, we have fabricated superhydrophobic hybrid MWCNTs membrane on mixed cellulose ester filter with great flexibility and tailorability. Importantly, induced by acetic acid vapour and NH vapour without external energy, wettability of it can be reversibly switched between superhydrophobic (low adhesion) to hydrophobic (high adhesion).

Engineering NiO sensitive materials and its ultra-selective detection of benzaldehyde.

Ongoing interest in oxide semiconductor as components of gas sensing devices is motivated by environmental monitoring and intelligent control. NiO with different precursor solution were synthesized by aqueous chemical deposition and pyrolysis process. Here the method is quite facile, green and free of surfactant.

Fabrication of stable and durable superhydrophobic surface on copper substrates for oil-water separation and ice-over delay.

We report a simple and rapid method to fabricate superhydrophobic films on copper substrates via Fe(3+) etching and octadecanethiol (ODT) modification. The etching process can be as short as 5 min and the ODT treatment only takes several seconds. In addition, the whole process is quite flexible in reaction time.

Tuning SnO2 architectures with unitary or composite microstructure for the application of gas sensors.

Different SnO2 architectures with unitary or binary structure were successfully assembled utilizing the assistance of Polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP). The microstructure, surface topography, specific surface area and gas sensing property were investigated with X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) and WS-60A gas sensing apparatus, respectively. The sensing amplitude, selectivity, response time and recovery time were carefully studied.

Comparison of the enhanced gas sensing properties of tin dioxide samples doped with different catalytic transition elements.

In this work, non-doped SnO2 samples, and SnO2 samples doped with Zn(II), Cu(II), or Mn(II), having hierarchical microstructures, were prepared using an otherwise identical hydrothermal process, followed by annealing. The morphological and structural characteristics of the samples were systematically characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) measurements, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Ten gas sensors were constructed from each material, and compared as to detection of gas-phase ethanol, acetone, glacial acetic acid, methanol, and ammonia.