Bio-inspired Interfacial Materials with Super-Wettability

This is the 2014 MRS Mid-Career Researcher Award talk, presented by Lei Jiang, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Learning from nature is a constant principle because nature provides us with numerous, mysterious properties that have developed over millions of years of evolution. Recent achievements include the following: (1) Original studies of the super-wettability of natural systems. (2) Creative approaches in design and fabrication of bioinspired smart interfacial materials with super-wettability. (3) Technology transfer of research findings in the laboratory to practical products.This talk is based on bio-inspired micro/nano-structured interfaces with special wettability, showing from lotus leaves, rice leaves, butterfly wings, water strider legs, mosquito eyes, to spider silk and cactus, revealing that the bio-inspired system not only presents new knowledge, but also has great prospective applications.

Lei Jiang was presented with the 2014 MRS Mid-Career Researcher Award “For establishing fundamental understanding of the interfacial properties of biological systems and transforming that insight into commercialized bioinspired materials with properties better than those of natural systems”