Temat: Wetter Report: New Approach to Testing Surface Adhesion

The NIST team developed a flexible technique, based on ultraviolet light and photosensitive materials, to mimic one of nature’s cleverest feats of surface chemistry. The Stenocara beetle of Africa’s Namib Desert is able to thrive in a habitat so parched that not even the morning fog will condense. All the beetle has to do is raise its warty-looking wing covers into the breeze. Because the bumps are hydrophilic, or water-attracting, while the rest of the surface is hydrophobic, or water-repelling, the few water molecules that do strike the wing covers tend to get pushed uphill and collect on the bumps—where they eventually condense into artificial dewdrops that roll into the insect’s mouth. The insect’s trick is to use both surface structure and chemistry to create a surface that shifts rapidly from hydrophobic to hydrophilic.

http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/techbeat/tb2007_051...
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pozdr.czes;-)