Manipulating liquid is of great significance in fields from life sciences to industrial applications. Owing to its advantages in manipulating liquids with high precision and flexibility, electrowetting on dielectric (EWOD) has been widely used in various applications. Despite this, its efficient operation generally needs electrode arrays and sophisticated circuit control. Here, we develop a largely unexplored triboelectric wetting (TEW) phenomenon that can directly exploit the triboelectric charges to achieve the programmed and precise water droplet control. This key feature lies in the rational design of a chemical molecular layer that can generate and store triboelectric charges through agile triboelectrification. The TEW eliminates the requirement of the electric circuit design and additional source input and allows for manipulating liquids of various compositions, volumes, and arrays on various substrates in a controllable manner. This previously unexplored wetting mechanism and control strategy will find diverse applications ranging from controllable chemical reactions to surface defogging.

The present investigation adopted long-term in-situ electrochemical and spectroscopic approaches to study the combined active, self-healing and passive protective mechanisms of a new class of innovative anti-corrosive coatings based on epoxy doped with clay nanotubes impregnated with active species for the protection of carbon steel in 3.5% NaCl solution. The suitability of the as-received clay nanotubes to encapsulate the active agents was confirmed by different spectroscopic measurements. Tube end stopper with Ferric ion and polymer encapsulation with chitosan cross-linked with glutaraldehyde were adopted to tunnel the release of the active agents loaded into the nanotubes. The improved passive barrier performances of the various innovative coatings were revealed by the electrochemical impedance spectroscopic, while their active feedback and self-healing abilities were revealed by the optical and spectroscopic techniques. The optical/spectroscopic techniques revealed the degree of pit formation at the steel/coating interface and the iron rust formation around the artificially marked defects, including the ability of the marked defects to self-heal over exposure times. Adhesion and impacts tests were adopted to compare the physical/mechanical properties of the various coatings. The results afforded insights into the effects of exposure time on the protective and failure behaviours of both the reference and modified coatings.

Designing scalable coatings with a wide spectrum of functions such as liquid repellency, anticorrosion, and antiflaming and a high level of mechano–chemical–thermal robustness is crucial in real‐life applications. However, these individual functionalities and robustness are coupled together or even have conflicting requirements on the interfacial or bulky properties of materials, and thus, simultaneously integrating all these individual features into one coating has proved challenging. Herein, an integral skin‐inspired triple‐layered coating (STC) that resolves conflicting demands imposed by individual features on the structural, chemical, mechanical, and thermal properties of materials is proposed. Specifically, the rational design of multiple gradients in roughness, wetting, strength, and flame retardancy and the formation of continuous interfaces along its triple layers endow a sustained liquid repellency, anticorrosion, and flame retardancy even under harsh environments, as well as strong antiabrasion on surfaces and adhesion with the substrate. Such an all‐in‐one design enhances the durability and lifetime of coatings and reduces the maintenance and repair, thereby contributing to cost and energy saving. Together with a facile spraying fabrication process, this STC provides a feasible and sustainable strategy for constructing energy and resource‐saving materials.

As the most common but indispensable matter to humankind, water usually stays in a macroscopically electric neutral state. Due to its inherent molecular polarity, however, water can be easily electrified, which builds a connection between water and electricity. Such a coupling of water and electricity abounds deep scientific basics and technological applications. The past several decades have witnessed extensive progress in studying the mutual effects between electricity and water, but a comprehensive review of its fundamentals and applications is still largely missing. In this review, we first reassess and classify the basic electrifying methods of water according to their mechanisms, then highlight how to leverage the bond nexus of water and electricity to achieve promising technical applications. We envision that this review will inspire multidisciplinary scientific communities to think and innovate more on the research of water, electricity, and their marriage.

Materials corrosion is a natural and ubiquitous interfacial process, but is essential to numerous industrial processes. Progress in industrial and material innovations is also marked by developments in search of new solutions to design materials with better anticorrosion activity and longer service lifetime. In particular, recent blossoming in biomimetics has provided remarkable inspirations to design new artificial, passive anticorrosion coatings which are environmentally benign and functional versatile. In this review, the authors first formulate three key design components that underlie the construction of an ideal protective coating, that is, the functional barrier at the coating surface, the transport control of corrosive substances inside the coating, as well as interfacial bonding between the passive coating and the substrate. Then, the authors take a parallel approach to elaborate inspirations from nature and review recent progress in mimicking nature. At last, the authors offer perspectives on the design and development of novel engineered, high-performance anticorrosion coatings.