Search for: All records

The gas (or plastron) trapped between micro/nano-scale surface textures, such as that on superhydrophobic surfaces, is crucial for many engineering applications, including drag reduction, heat and mass transfer enhancement, anti-biofouling, anti-icing, and self-cleaning. However, the longevity of the plastron is significantly affected by gas diffusion, a process where gas molecules slowly diffuse into the ambient liquid. In this work, we demonstrated that plastron longevity could be extended using a gas-soluble and gas-permeable polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) surface. We performed experiments for PDMS surfaces consisting of micro-posts and micro-holes. We measured the plastron longevity in undersaturated liquids by an optical method. Our results showed that the plastron longevity increased with increasing the thickness of the PDMS surface, suggesting that gas initially dissolved between polymer chains was transferred to the liquid, delaying the wetting transition. Numerical simulations confirmed that a thicker PDMS material released more gas across the PDMS–liquid interface, resulting in a higher gas concentration near the plastron. Furthermore, we found that plastron longevity increased with increasing pressure differences across the PDMS material, indicating that the plastron was replenished by the gas injected through the PDMS. With increasing pressure, the mass flux caused by gas injection surpassed the mass flux caused by the diffusion of gas from plastron to liquid. Overall, our results provide new solutions for extending plastron longevity and will have significant impacts on engineering applications where a stable plastron is desired. 

3D Printing (3DP), also known as Additive Manufacturing (AM) is the latest production technology. Its popularity in fabricating functional parts in all fields is growing day by day. The range of 3D printed products is limitless, including glass frames to hearing aids. It is thus important to train educators and students regarding this cutting-edge technology so that they become familiar with the functionality and implementation of it in several courses, laboratories, and projects. This paper reports several novel developments which have been implemented in the past few years, including details of these unique practices and feedback received from the educators and students.