Dry under water: air retaining properties of large-scale elastomer foils covered with mushroom-shaped surface microstructures

Superhydrophobic surfaces are well known for most different functions in plants, animals, and thus for biomimetic technical applications. Beside the Lotus Effect, one of their features with great technical, economic and ecologic potential is the Salvinia Effect, the capability to keep a stable air layer when submerged under water. Such air layers are of great importance, e.g., for drag reduction (passive air lubrication), antifouling, sensor applications or oil–water separation. Some biological models, e.g., the floating fern Salvinia or the backswimmer Notonecta, show long term stable air retention even under hydrodynamic conditions. Therefore, they are ideal models for the development of technical biomimetic air retaining surfaces. Up to now, several prototypes of such surfaces have been developed, but none provides both, stable air retention and cost effective large scale production. Meanwhile, a novel biomimetic surface is commercially available and produced on a large scale: an adhesive elastomeric film with mushroom-shaped surface microstructures that mimic the adhesion system of animals. In this study, we show that these films, which have been initially developed for a different purpose, due to their specific geometry at the microscale, are capable of stable air retention under water. We present first results concerning the capabilities of mushroom-shaped surface microstructures and show that this elastomer foil is able to stabilize a permanent air layer under water for more than two weeks. Further, the stability of the air layer under pressure was investigated and these results are compared with the predicted theoretical values for air retention of microstructured surfaces. Here, we could show that they fit to the theoretical predictions and that the biomimetic elastomer foil is a promising base for the development of an economically and efficient biomimetic air retaining surface for a broad range of technical applications.