Solar anti-icing surface with enhanced condensate self-removing at extreme environmental conditions

Abstract

The inhibition of condensation freezing under extreme conditions (i.e., ultra-low temperature and high humidity) remains a daunting challenge in the field of anti-icing. As water vapor easily condensates or desublimates and melted water refreezes instantly, these cause significant performance decrease of most anti-icing surfaces at such extreme conditions. Herein, inspired by wheat leaves, an effective condensate self-removing solar anti-icing/frosting surface (CR-SAS) is fabricated using ultrafast pulsed laser deposition technology, which exhibits synergistic effects of enhanced condensate self-removal and efficient solar anti-icing. The superblack CR-SAS displays superior anti-reflection and photothermal conversion performance, benefiting from the light trapping effect in the micro/nano hierarchical structures and the thermoplasmonic effect of the iron oxide nanoparticles. Meanwhile, the CR-SAS displays superhydrophobicity to condensed water, which can be instantly shed off from the surface before freezing through self-propelled droplet jumping, thus leading to a continuously refreshed dry area available for sunlight absorption and photothermal conversion. Under one-sun illumination, the CR-SAS can be maintained ice free even under an ambient environment of −50 °C ultra-low temperature and extremely high humidity (ice supersaturation degree of ∼260). The excellent environmental versatility, mechanical durability, and material adaptability make CR-SAS a promising anti-icing candidate for broad practical applications even in harsh environments.

All-Day Anti-Icing/Deicing Film Based on Combined Photo-Electro-Thermal Conversion

“…Dash et al developed a scalable photo-thermal trap exhibiting efficient solar deicing performance . Zhang et al fabricated a film with efficient solar anti-icing and enhanced condensate self-removing effects …”

Electro‐/Photo‐Thermal Promoted Anti‐Icing Materials: A New Strategy Combined with Passive Anti‐Icing and Active De‐Icing

“…Compared with electro‐thermal heat techniques, solar energy as the renewable source is free and sustainable from nature. Recently, researchers investigated sun light (or artifical light) to replace electric power, and developed photo‐thermal promoted AIM by combining passive AIM (i.e., SHSs, [ 106 ] lubricating surfaces, [ 107–110 ] and other icephobic surfaces [ 111,112 ] ) ( Figure ) with active photo‐thermal heating with the help of various absorbers (i.e., Fe 3 O 4 , [ 107,108,113–115 ] candle soot, [ 12,116 ] carbon nanotubes (CNTs), [ 89,90,112,117–126 ] carbon nanofibers, [ 111 ] CNTs/Fe 3 O 4 @poly(cyclotriphosphazene‐co‐4,4′‐sulfonyldiphenol) (PZS), [ 127 ] cermet, [ 32 ] I 2 , [ 128 ] SiC, [ 129 ] polypyrrole (PPy), [ 98 ] melanin, [ 130 ] CNTs/SiO 2 , [ 131 ] Fe/candle soot, [ 106 ] Fe/Cu, [ 132 ] titanium nitride (TiN), [ 133,134 ] Ti 2 O 3 , [ 135 ] Au/TiO 2 , [ 66,136 ] Au/SiO 2 , [ 137 ] reduced graphene oxide (rGO), [ 138 ] graphite, [ 139 ] SiO 2 /CuFeMnO 4 , [ 140 ] MXene, [ 141 ] and black engineered aluminum [ 142,143 ] ) (See Table 3 ). Generally, the absorption capacity of these absorbers differs from one to another, and the photo‐thermal effect usually occurs under different light wavelengths, such as solar radiation, [ 107 ] near infrared irradiation, [ 89,108,118,129 ] and infrared irradiation (See Table 3).…”

“…fabricated an effective solar anti‐icing surface with superhydrophobicity, and this photo‐thermal SHS (fraction of dry area is 72%) can reach 5.5 °C within 1400 s under 1 sun illumination with an ambient temperature of −50 °C. [ 132 ] Interestingly, they found that a certain fraction of dry area is necessary for the rational design of photo‐thermal promoted AIM to remain unfrozen under a specific environmental condition (i.e., −50 °C under 1 sun). [ 132 ] Zhang et al.…”

“…[ 132 ] Interestingly, they found that a certain fraction of dry area is necessary for the rational design of photo‐thermal promoted AIM to remain unfrozen under a specific environmental condition (i.e., −50 °C under 1 sun). [ 132 ] Zhang et al. reported that the ice layer (i.e., at −20 °C) on superhydrphobic photo‐thermal CNTs‐SiO 2 /epoxy coating can be completely removed after 60 s under near‐infrared irradiation (1 W cm –2 ), while it cannot be melted on the normal photo‐thermal promoted epoxy coating even after 300 s under the same condition.…”

Virus‐Like Iron Oxide Minerals Inspired by Magnetotactic Bacteria: Towards an Outstanding Photothermal Superhydrophobic Platform on Universal Substrates

“…[ 3 ] In addition, other photo‐active materials were hybridized to achieve a complementary or synergetic photothermal effect. [ 4 ] Very recently, taking advantage of ultrafast pulsed laser deposition technology, Zhang and coworkers [ 5 ] fabricated hierarchically structured iron oxides with ultralow reflectance and high light‐to‐heat conversion. The rational design of surface morphologies opens an avenue for high light‐harvesting, which has also been demonstrated on forest‐like graphene film.…”