Observation of hydrophobic-like behavior in geometrically patterned hydrophilic microchannels.
We present our observation of meta-hydrophobicity, where geometrically patterned surfaces make hydrophilic microchannels exhibit hydrophobic-like behaviors. We analyze the wetting-induced energy decrease that results from the surface geometries and experimentally demonstrate how those geometries can modulate the dynamics of capillary-driven wetting and evaporation-driven drying of microfluidic systems. Our results also show that the modulated wetting dynamics can be employed to generate regulated patterns of microbubbles.
G O F
GO
Parikesit
E X
EX
Vrouwe
M T
MT
Blom
J
J
Westerweel