TY - JOUR
T1 - Furcated droplet motility on crystalline surfaces
AU - Tang, Xin
AU - Li, Wei
AU - Wang, Liqiu
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank W.-D. Li and S.-P. Feng for equipment support, Y. Chen and H. Yu for valuable discussion and Z. Zhou for assistance in the experiment. L.W. acknowledges financial support from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong (grant nos. GRF 17205421, 17204420, 17210319, 17204718 and CRF C1006-20WF, C1018-17G). X.T. acknowledges support from the Research Grants Council Postdoctoral Fellowship Scheme. This work was also supported in part by the Zhejiang Provincial, Hangzhou Municipal and Lin’an County governments.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.
PY - 2021/10
Y1 - 2021/10
N2 - Directed liquid motion has been conventionally mediated by functionalizing chemical inhomogeneity or texturing topological anisotropy on target surfaces. Here we show the self-propulsion of droplets that furcated in well-defined directions on piezoelectric single crystals in the absence of any apparent asymmetry or external force. By selecting the crystal plane to interface with the droplets, the thermoelastic–piezoelectric interplay yields intricate electric potential profiles, enabling various forms of self-propulsion including unidirectional, bifurcated and trifurcated. This effect originates from an anisotropic crystalline structure that generates contrasting macroscopic liquid behaviours and is observed with cold/hot and volatile droplets. Intrinsically oriented liquid motions have broad applicability in processes ranging from soft matter engineering, autonomous material delivery and thermal management to biochemical analysis.
AB - Directed liquid motion has been conventionally mediated by functionalizing chemical inhomogeneity or texturing topological anisotropy on target surfaces. Here we show the self-propulsion of droplets that furcated in well-defined directions on piezoelectric single crystals in the absence of any apparent asymmetry or external force. By selecting the crystal plane to interface with the droplets, the thermoelastic–piezoelectric interplay yields intricate electric potential profiles, enabling various forms of self-propulsion including unidirectional, bifurcated and trifurcated. This effect originates from an anisotropic crystalline structure that generates contrasting macroscopic liquid behaviours and is observed with cold/hot and volatile droplets. Intrinsically oriented liquid motions have broad applicability in processes ranging from soft matter engineering, autonomous material delivery and thermal management to biochemical analysis.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85110599340&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1038/s41565-021-00945-w
DO - 10.1038/s41565-021-00945-w
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 34282311
AN - SCOPUS:85110599340
SN - 1748-3387
VL - 16
SP - 1106
EP - 1112
JO - Nature Nanotechnology
JF - Nature Nanotechnology
IS - 10
ER -