Apparatus and methods employing liquid-impregnated surfaces

Abstract

In certain embodiments, the invention is directed to apparatus comprising a liquid-impregnated surface, said surface comprising an impregnating liquid and a matrix of solid features spaced sufficiently close to stably contain the impregnating liquid therebetween or therewithin, and methods thereof. In some embodiments, one or both of the following holds: (i) 0<ϕ≤0.25, where ϕ is a representative fraction of the projected surface area of the liquid-impregnated surface corresponding to non-submerged solid at equilibrium; and (ii) Sow(a)<0, where Sow(a) is spreading coefficient, defined as γwa−γwo−γoa, where γ is the interfacial tension between the two phases designated by subscripts w, a, and o, where w is water, a is air, and o is the impregnating liquid.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.