Issues of surfaces, e.g., inspired from beetle’s back, spider silk, cactus stem, etc., become the active area ofresearch on designing novel materials in need of human beings to acquire fresh water resource from air.However, the design of materials on surface structure is little achieved on controlling of micro-scale droptransport in a long distance. Here, we report the ability of micro-drop transport in a long distance on a
bioinspired Fibers with Gradient Spindle-knots (BFGS), which are fabricated by tilt angle dip-coatingmethod. The micro-drop of ~0.25 mL transports in distance of ~ 5.00 mm, with velocity of 0.10–0.22 m/son BFGS. It is attributed to the multi-level cooperation of the release energy of drop coalescence along thegradient spindle-knots, in addition to capillary adhesion force and continuous difference of Laplacepressure, accordingly, water drops are driven to move fast directionally in a long distance on BFGS.
http://www.nature.com/srep/2013/131011/srep02927/full/srep02927.html
