New triphenylene-based silanes 2-(ω-(chlorodimethylsilyl)-n-alkyl)-3,6,7,10,11-penta-m-alkoxytriphenylene 4 (Tm-Cn) with n = 8 or 9 and m = 7, 8, 9, 10, or 11 were synthesized, and their self-assembly behavior in the liquid state and at glass and silicon oxide surfaces was investigated. The mesomorphic properties of triphenylene silanes 4 (Tm-Cn) and their ...

Free energy of contact ion-pair (CIP) formation of lithium ion with BF(4)(-) and PF(6)(-) in water, propylene carbonate (PC), dimethyl carbonate (DMC) are quantitatively analyzed using MD simulations combined with the energy representation method. The relative stabilities of the mono-, bi-, and tridentate coordination structures are assessed with and without ...

We investigated the contact behaviors of a nanoscopic stiff thin film bonded to a compliant substrate and derived an analytical solution for determining the elastic modulus of thin films. Microscopic contact deformations of the gold and polydopamine thin films (< 200 nm) coated on polydimethylsiloxane elastomers were measured by indenting ...

Ionic liquids (ILs) form non-fluidic layers at the solid-liquid interface. The properties of IL interfacial layer play important roles in the IL-based applications. Since the liquid phase IL directly contacts and interacts with the IL interfacial layer rather than the underneath substrate, the surface properties of the interfacial layer could ...

The orientational relaxation dynamics of water confined between mica surfaces is investigated using molecular dynamics simulations. The study illustrates the wide heterogeneity that exists in the dynamics of water adjacent to a strongly hydrophilic surface such as mica. Analysis of the survival probabilities in different layers is carried out by ...

This study presents a straightforward two-step fabrication process of durable, completely superhydrophobic micro-channels in PDMS. First, a composite material of PDMS/PTFE particles is prepared and used to replicate a master microstructure. Superhydrophobic surfaces are formed by subsequent plasma treatment, in which the PDMS is isotropically etched and PTFE particles are ...

Attempts at depositing uniform films of nanoparticles by drop-drying have been frustrated by the "coffee-stain" effect, due to convective macroscopic flow into the contact line. Here we show that uniform deposition of nanoparticles in aqueous suspensions can be attained easily by drying the droplet in an ethanol vapor atmosphere. This ...

Biocompatible hydrogels have many applications, ranging from contact lenses to tissue engineering scaffolds. In most cases, rigorous sterilization is essential. Herein we show that a biocompatible diblock copolymer forms worm-like micelles via polymerization-induced self-assembly in aqueous solution. At a copolymer concentration of 10.0 w/v %, inter-worm entanglements lead to the ...

  Studies examined the effects of meat-contact material types, inoculation substrate, presence of air at the liquid-solid surface interface during incubation, and incubation substrate on the attachment/transfer and subsequent biofilm formation by Escherichia coli O157:H7 on beef carcass fabrication surface materials. Materials studied as 2 × 5 cm coupons included stainless steel, ...

The objective of the present study was to investigate the effect of polyarginine chain length on topical delivery of surface modified NLCs. Design of experiments (DOE) was used to optimize number of arginines required to deliver active drug into deeper skin layers. The NLCs were prepared by hot-melt technique and ...

Describing wetting of a liquid on a rough or structured surface is a challenge, because of the wide range of involved length scales. Nano- and micrometer-sized textures cause pinning of the contact line, reflected in a hysteresis of the contact angle. To investigate contact angles at different length scales, we ...

Biofilms are surface-associated bacterial aggregates, in which bacteria are enveloped by polymeric substances known as the biofilm matrix. Bacillus subtilis biofilms display persistent resistance to liquid wetting and gas penetration, which probably explains the broad-spectrum resistance of the bacteria in these biofilms to antimicrobial agents. In this study, BslA (formerly ...

In this work two computational recipes based on atomistic molecular dynamics simulations are developed and compared to quickly and accurately quantify the interactions of amorphous polypropylene surface with water and oil. Fundamental quantities such as contact angle, surface tension, and work of adhesion are estimated, which are found to be ...

Reflective binary Fresnel lenses fabricated so far all suffer from reflections from the opaque zones and hence degradation in focusing and lensing properties. Here a solution is found to this problem by developing a carbon nanotube Fresnel lens, where the darkest man-made material ever, i.e., low-density vertically aligned carbon nanotube ...

Hydrophobins are small proteins secreted by fungi, which self-assemble into amphipathic membranes at air-liquid or liquid-solid interfaces. The physical and chemical properties of some hydrophobins, both in solution and as a biofilm, are affected by poly or oligosaccharides. We have studied the interaction between glucose and the hydrophobin Vmh2 from ...

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to compare four medium particles currently used for in vitro composite wear testing (glass and PMMA beads and millet and poppy seeds). METHODS: Particles were prepared as described in previous wear studies. Hardness of medium particles was measured with a nano-indentor, particle size ...

In this work, a method was developed for indirectly estimating contact angles of sessile liquid drops on convex and concave surfaces. Assuming that drops were sufficiently small that no gravitational distortion occurred, equations were derived to compute intrinsic contact angles from the radius of curvature of the solid surface, the ...

Photocrosslinkable methacrylated hyaluronic acid (HA) was prepared and incorporated into model conventional and silicone hydrogel contact lenses as an internal wetting agent. The molecular weight of the HA, the degree of methacrylation as well as the amount (0.25 to 1.0 wt %) incorporated were varied. The HA-containing hydrogels were analyzed ...

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY: The aim of the present study was to evaluate the ototoxicity of Burow solution. PROCEDURES: Compound action potentials (CAPs) of the eighth nerve were measured before and 30 minutes after the application of the Burow solution in the middle ear cavity. RESULTS: Use of the original ...

In this work, a new procedure is demonstrated to retrieve the conservative and dissipative contributions to contact resonance atomic force microscopy (CR-AFM) measurements from the contact resonance frequency and resonance amplitude. By simultaneously tracking the CR-AFM frequency and amplitude during contact AFM scanning, the contact stiffness and damping were mapped ...

Objective: To quantify and compare the physiochemical properties of various topical emollients and to correlate these findings with the products' potential to maintain the stratum corneum (SC) acid milieu, while possessing the appropriate water content for skin rehydration, user adherence, and comfort. Material and Methods: The pH and hydrophilic fraction ...

By promoting dropwise condensation of water, nanostructured superhydrophobic coatings have the potential to dramatically increase the heat transfer rate during this phase change process. As a consequence, these coatings may be a facile method of enhancing the efficiency of power generation and water desalination systems. However, microdroplet growth mechanism on ...

This study clarifies the ablation differences in air and in water for hard biological tissues, which are irradiated by fiber-guided long-pulsed holmium lasers. High-speed photography is used to record the dynamic characteristics of ablation plumes and vaporization bubbles induced by pulsed holmium lasers. The ablation morphologies and depth of hard ...

The synergistic effect between Pt and WC is beneficial for methanol electro-oxidation, and makes Pt-WC catalyst a promising anode candidate for the direct methanol fuel cell. This paper reports on the design and synthesis of small-sized and contacting Pt-WC nanostructures on graphene that bring the synergistic effect into full play. ...

Methylated quartz surfaces are extensively used in colloid science for wettability studies and the control and impact of hydrophobicity in key physicochemical processes. In this study, Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) has been used to correlate the surface chemistry of trimethylchlorosilane-methylated quartz surfaces with contact angle. Models have been ...

Coatings derived from surface active block copolymers (SABC) having a combination of hydrophobic aliphatic (linear hydrocarbon or propylene oxide derived groups) and hydrophilic PEG side chains have been developed. The coatings demonstrate superior performance against protein adsorption as well as resistance to biofouling, providing an alternative to coatings containing fluorinated ...

Here, we demonstrate that the assembly of nanostructures with different dimensionalities yields 'multicomponent hybrid' transparent conductive films (TCFs) with sheet resistance and optical transmittance comparable to indium tin oxide (ITO) films. It was shown that sheet resistance of single component Ag nanowire (NW) films can be further decreased by introducing ...

The sodium chloride surface is one of the most common platforms for the study of catalysts, thin film growth, and atmospheric aerosols. Here we report a nanoscale periodic modulation pattern on the surface of a cleaved NaCl single crystal, revealed by non-contact atomic force microscopy with a tuning fork sensor. ...

A diblock copolymer consisting of a sol-gel-forming block and a fluorinated block was used to coat cotton fabrics, yielding textiles that were highly oil- and water-repellent. The coating procedure was simple. At grafted polymer amounts of as low as 1.0 wt %, water, diodomethane, hexadecane, cooking oil, and pump oil ...

Dewetting induced self-organisation was used to prepare an ordered microstructure from a highly volatile liquid. Dewetting of an evaporating iron oxide precursor solute on silicon substrate resulted in arrays of microdots with nearly hexagonal and tetragonal symmetries. Ordered structures form either by stick-slip motion or fingering instability at the receding ...

Purpose: A lipophilic dye is used to investigate the degree to which the surface and bulk hydrophobic domains of the lenses can be imaged and identify specific changes in the availability of those domains after in vitro wear and cleaning conditions. The effect of a multipurpose solution (MPS), OPTI-FREE® RepleniSH®, ...

Thrombus formation and microbial invasion are two major complications that impede the widespread application of blood-contacting devices. The development of new materials that have blood compatibility and antibacterial adhesion activity has gained increased attention. In this study, a new class of polymers composed of hydrophilic dendronized polyethylene glycol (PEG) methacrylate ...

Nanoelectromechanical devices exhibiting dramatically improved robustness through novel material selection are demonstrated. A unique combination of carbon nanotube active elements and conductive diamond-like carbon contact electrodes results in reliable switching performance not found in devices with ubiquitously-used metal thin film electrodes. This in turn represents a viable means to improve ...

The resistive switching (RS) characteristics of a tungsten oxide (WO(x) )-Au core-shell nanowire device array is demonstrated for the first time. In addition to the stable bipolar RS characteristics, the nanowire structure of our RS devices provides superhydrophobic properties. The superhydrophobic RS nanowires repelled water that was poured over, such ...

We present a definition of intermolecular surface contact by applying weighted Voronoi tessellations to configurations of various organic liquids and water obtained from molecular dynamics simulations. This definition of surface contact is used to link the COSMO-RS model and molecular dynamics simulations. We demonstrate that additively weighted tessellation is the ...

In this paper, a hydrostatic model of the surface profile anchored to the upper edge of a vertical cylinder is proposed to explain why coins can float on water surface. The sharp edge of a cylinder is thus modeled as a round smooth surface on which the contact line may ...

Superhydrophobic coatings with a static water contact angle (WCA)>150° were prepared by modifying ZnO nanoparticles with stearic acid (ZnO@SA). ZnO nanoparticles of size ∼14nm were prepared by solution combustion method. X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies reveal that as prepared ZnO has hexagonal wurtzite structure whereas the modified coatings convert to zinc ...

In nanobiotechnology properties of surfaces are often key to sensor applications. If analytes possess a low tolerance or affinity regarding the sensory substrate (surface), the set-up of mediators may be indicated. Hydrophobins enable biocompatible surface functionalization without significant restrictions of the physicochemical substrate properties. Because of imperfect formation of hydrophobin ...

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Water is an integral part of protein complexes. It shapes protein binding sites by filling cavities and it bridges local contacts by hydrogen bonds. However, water molecules are usually not included in protein interface models in the past, and few distribution profiles of water molecules in protein binding ...

Raspberry- and Mulberry-like hierarchically structured silica particulate coatings were fabricated via facile in-situ layer-by-layer assembly with monodisperse silica nanoparticles (NPs) of two different sizes followed by calcination. Raspberry-like and mulberry-like silica particulate coatings were achieved when the size ratio of two silica particles was 20/200 nm and 20/70 nm, respectively. ...

The effect of surfactants' type and concentration on the interfacial tension and contact angle in the presence of hydrophilic silica particles was investigated. Silica particles have been shown to have an antagonistic effect on interfacial tension and contact angle in the presence of both W/O and O/W surfactants. Silica particles, ...

The present work reports new sensors for the direct determination of Microcystin-LR (MC-LR) in environmental waters. Both selective membrane and solid contact were optimized to ensure suitable analytical features in potentiometric transduction. The sensing layer consisted of Imprinted Sol-Gel (ISG) materials capable of establishing surface interactions with MC-LR. Non-Imprinted Sol-Gel ...

The wetting behavior of fluorocarbon materials has been studied with the aim of assessing the influence of the surface chemical composition and surface roughness on the water advancing and receding contact angles. Diamond like carbon and two fluorocarbon materials with different fluorine content have been prepared by plasma enhanced chemical ...

Surface ligand molecules enabling gold nanoparticles to disperse in both polar and nonpolar solvents through changes in conformation are presented. Gold nanoparticles coated with alkyl-head-capped PEG derivatives were initially well dispersed in water through exposure of the PEG residue (bent form). When chloroform was added to the aqueous solution of ...

The sliding of drops of aqueous solutions of organic liquids over a superhydrophobic polypropylene (SH-PP) surface has been studied experimentally. The multi-scale roughness of this surface is intrinsically inhomogeneous. Careful analysis of the wettability of each solution enables us to establish the statistics of the advancing and receding contact angles. ...

A single kinesin motor domain immersed in water has been investigated using molecular dynamics. It has been found that local properties of water in the solvation shell change along with the nature of the neighboring protein surface. However, a detailed analysis leads to the conclusion that the geometrical features of ...

A method of electrically contacting vertically grown nanowires of uneven heights, a common scenario among as-grown nanowires, is reported here using a chemically synthesized single crystalline Au microplate as top electrode. The contact is electrically activated and the contact formation is predominantly due to electromigration combined with tunneling. With this ...

A simple method to convert gold from waste gold solutions used in chemical laboratories and chemical industries into metallic gold nano particles using styrene maleic acid copolymer beads has been approached. The styrene maleic acid copolymer beads with an average bead diameter 400-600 microns, exhibiting exceptionally high rough surface was ...

The contamination of implant devices as a result of biofilm formation through bacterial infection has instigated major research in this area, particularly to understand the mechanism of bacterial cell/implant surface interactions and their preventions. In this paper, we demonstrate a controlled method of nanostructured titanium oxide surface synthesis using supersonic ...

We report on a novel material, tetrakis(4-chlorophenyl)borate (TB-) anions doped nanocluster films, as the solid contact (SC) for producing well-defined, electrochemically reversible and non-polarizable double interfaces on it. Detailed studies have unambiguously revealed that, for the first time, the developed SC can fully overcome all the signal stability problems of ...