title: Bioinspired Smart Peristome Surface for Temperature-Controlled Unidirectional Water Spreading.
abstract: Unidirectional liquid spreading without energy input has attracted considerable attention due to various potential applications such as biofluidics devices and self-lubrication. Introducing a surface wettable gradient or asymmetric nanostructures onto the surface has successfully harnessed the liquid to spread unidirectionally. However, these surfaces are still plagued with problems that restrict their practical applications: fixed spreading state for a fixed surface, and spreading slowly over a short distance. Herein, bioinspired from the fast continuous unidirectional water transport on the peristome of Nepenthes alata, we report a smart peristome with temperature-controlled unidirectional water spreading. The smart artificial peristome was fabricated by grafting the thermoresponsive material PNIPAAm onto the artificial PDMS peristome. Unidirectional water spreading on the smart peristome can be dynamically regulated by changing the surface temperature. Besides, the water spreading is demonstrated with a remarkable reversibility and stability. By investigating the relationship between liquid spreading distance and wettability, the underlying mechanism was revealed. This work gives a new way to achieve the control of unidirectional liquid spreading available for controllable microfluidics and medical devices.
authors.affiliation: School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Beihang University , Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Pengfei
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3038-3474
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Beihang University , Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Huawei
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: CAS Key Laboratory of Bio-inspired Materials and Interfacial Science, CAS Center for Excellence in Nanoscience, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Li
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: CAS Key Laboratory of Bio-inspired Materials and Interfacial Science, CAS Center for Excellence in Nanoscience, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Hongliang
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Beihang University , Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Guang
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Beihang University , Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Liwen
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: School of Mechanical Engineering and Automation, Beihang University , Beijing 100191, China.
authors.forename: Deyuan
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: CAS Key Laboratory of Bio-inspired Materials and Interfacial Science, CAS Center for Excellence in Nanoscience, Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Lei
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4579-728X
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Jiang
keywords: Nepenthes alata; artificial peristome; smart surface; temperature-controlled water spreading; unidirectional liquid spreading