A comprehensive and systematic treatment that focuses on surfaces and interfaces phenomena inhabited in biomimetic superhydrophobic materials, offering new fundamentals and novel insights. As such, this new book covers the natural surfaces, fundamentals, fabrication methods and exciting applications of superhydrophobic materials, with particular attention paid to the smart surfaces that can show switchable and reversible water wettability under external stimuli, such as pH, temperature, light, solvents, and electric fields. It also includes recent theoretical advances of superhydrophobic surfaces with regard to the wetting process, and some promising breakthroughs to promote this theory. As a result, materials scientists, physicists, physical chemists, chemical engineers, and biochemists will benefit greatly from a deeper understanding of this topic.

A comprehensive and systematic treatment that focuses on surfaces and interfaces phenomena inhabited in biomimetic superhydrophobic materials, offering new fundamentals and novel insights. As such, this new book covers the natural surfaces, fundamentals, fabrication methods and exciting applications of superhydrophobic materials, with particular attention paid to the smart surfaces that can show switchable and reversible water wettability under external stimuli, such as pH, temperature, light, solvents, and electric fields. It also includes recent theoretical advances of superhydrophobic surfaces with regard to the wetting process, and some promising breakthroughs to promote this theory. As a result, materials scientists, physicists, physical chemists, chemical engineers, and biochemists will benefit greatly from a deeper understanding of this topic.

Superhydrophobic Surfaces analyzes the fundamental concepts of superhydrophobicity and gives insight into the design of superhydrophobic surfaces. The book serves as a reference for the manufacturing of materials with superior water-repellency, self-cleaning, anti-icing and corrosion resistance. It thoroughly discusses many types of hydrophobic surfaces such as natural superhydrophobic surfaces, superhydrophobic polymers, metallic superhydrophobic surfaces, biological interfaces, and advanced/hybrid superhydrophobic surfaces. Provides an adequate blend of complex engineering concepts with in-depth explanations of biological principles guiding the advancement of these technologies Describes complex ideas in simple scientific language, avoiding overcomplicated equations and discipline-specific jargon Includes practical information for manufacturing superhydrophobic surfaces Written by experts with complementary skills and diverse scientific backgrounds in engineering, microbiology and surface sciences

Surface properties play critical roles in determining the durability and overall performance of polymeric materials for applications in many different fields. Recent investigations on naturally superhydrophobic surfaces such as plant leaves and insect wings led to a clear understanding of the close relationship between surface topography, roughness, chemical structure and superhydrophobicity. This led to a dramatic increase in research efforts on the preparation and characterisation of polymeric systems with superhydrophobic surfaces. Current and potential uses of such materials in a wide range of applications also make them commercially very attractive.The main focus of this book is to provide a comprehensive overview of the new developments regarding the preparation and characterisation of superhydrophobic polymeric surfaces. A large number of methods used in the preparation of robust and durable superhydrophobic polymer surfaces and their advantages and disadvantages are discussed. Close relationship between the polymer composition, hierarchical micro/nano surface topography and superhydrophobic behavior are provided. In addition to the practical aspects, special emphasis is also given to the discussion of the theoretical foundations of the wetting behavior of rough surfaces.Nature is the ultimate guide for the preparation of functional materials and surfaces. As discussed in detail in the book, using biomimetic approaches it is possible to design and produce superhydrophobic surfaces with interesting functionalities. The most critical tasks for the scientists and engineers working in the field seem to be; (i) to clearly understand the relations between surface compositions, topography and surface properties; (ii) to develop simple laboratory techniques and commercially viable production methods to produce superhydrophobic surfaces and devices mimicking the natural systems; and (iii) to demonstrate novel applications in research laboratory and develop commercial applications for these materials with smart and multifunctional surfaces.This book provides a clear understanding of the theoretical foundations of superhydrophobicity together with practical experimental guidance for the preparation of such polymeric surfaces to researchers and application engineers working in the field.

Materials with superhydrophobic or related properties are one of the most studied subjects from a theoretical point of view and also for the large range of possible applications, for example, anticorrosion, antibacteria, optical devices, and sensors. The study of natural species with special wettability has shown us the importance of surface structures and the surface energy of the resulting surface properties. Various strategies can be used to reproduce superhydrophobic phenomena in the laboratory. General reviews on superhydrophobic properties already exist but, to our knowledge, do not focus on metallic and inorganic materials. Here, we focus especially on the strategies implemented for reaching superhydrophobic or related properties using metallic and inorganic materials. Indeed, these materials present unique properties, for example, thermal and mechanical resistance, chemical and ageing resistance, and optical (transparency, antireflection, photoluminescence) and electrical properties (conducting, semiconducting, insulating). This book will be useful for graduate students of materials chemistry and physics and for researchers in surface science, nanostructures, and bioinspired or biomimetic materials.

Superhydrophobic surfaces (water contact angles higher than 150º) can only be achieved by a combination of hydrophobicity (low surface energy materials) with appropriate surface texture. In nature one can find an array of impressive and elegant examples of superhydrophobic surfaces. For example, on a lotus leaf rain drops bounce off after impact, then entirely roll off the lotus leaf and drag along any dirt particles, without leaving residues. The artificial design of superhydrophobic and self-cleaning surfaces has become an extremely active area of fundamental and applied research.This book presents both fundamental and applied aspects of superhydrophobic surfaces. It describes also different strategies for making superhydrophobic surfaces from a large diversity of materials (polymers, metals and other inorganic materials, composites) and processes (lithographic techniques, electrochemical processes, self-assembly processes, colloidal particles, sol-gel processes, nanofilaments, or simple scraping).A bountiful of information is covered in this book which represents cumulative wisdom of many world-renowned researchers in the fascinating and burgeoning area of superhydrophobic surfaces.

Multiscale Dissipative Mechanisms and Hierarchical Surfaces covers the rapidly developing topics of hierarchical surfaces, roughness-induced superhydrophobicity and biomimetic surfaces. The research in these topics has been progressing rapidly in the recent years due to the advances in the nanosciences and surfaces science and due to potential applications in nanotechnology. The first in its field, this monograph provides a comprehensive review of these subjects and presents the background introduction as well as recent and new results in the area.