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Gold microstructure substrate with tunable wettability

  • Posted By
    10Pointer
  • Categories
    Science & Technology
  • Published
    21st Jan, 2021

Scientists have developed a gold microstructure substrate with the ability to repel water as well as bubbles with tunable wettability.

Context

Scientists have developed a gold microstructure substrate with the ability to repel water as well as bubbles with tunable wettability.

Gold microstructure substrate

  • The substrate showed hydrophobic nature, which gets magnified when coated with a self-assembled monolayer of octadecane thiol - a water-soluble sulfur compound with a carbon alkyl chain.
  • The coating results in a reduction in surface energy, which in turn facilitates an enhancement in hydrophobic behaviour.
  • Underwater wettability investigations on the substrate showed that it mainly repelled bubbles and when functionalised with coating of octadecanethiol, it repels mainly oil.

How the development is significant?

  • It can be used in designing microfluidic devices, biosensors and useful in water transportation and self-cleaning.

What is Wettability?

  • Wettability is the ability of a liquid to maintain contact with a solid surface.
  • It is an important property in surface and interface science.
  • Its influence is seen in many biochemical processes, sensing, microfluidics, water transportation, self-cleaning, industrial processes.
  • The tunable wettability results from tunability in surface energy of the substrate, which can be utilized to regulate the direction of flow in water transportation and self-cleaning applications.

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