Issue 56, 2015

Engineering a nanostructured “super surface” with superhydrophobic and superkilling properties

Abstract

We present a nanostructured “super surface” fabricated using a simple recipe based on deep reactive ion etching of a silicon wafer. The topography of the surface is inspired by the surface topographical features of dragonfly wings. The super surface is comprised of nanopillars 4 μm in height and 220 nm in diameter with random inter-pillar spacing. The surface exhibited superhydrophobicity with a static water contact angle of 154.0° and contact angle hysteresis of 8.3°. Bacterial studies revealed the bactericidal property of the surface against both gram negative (Escherichia coli) and gram positive (Staphylococcus aureus) strains through mechanical rupture of the cells by the sharp nanopillars. The cell viability on these nanostructured surfaces was nearly six-fold lower than on the unmodified silicon wafer. The nanostructured surface also killed mammalian cells (mouse osteoblasts) through mechanical rupture of the cell membrane. Thus, such nanostructured super surfaces could find applications for designing self-cleaning and anti-bacterial surfaces in diverse applications such as microfluidics, surgical instruments, pipelines and food packaging.

Graphical abstract: Engineering a nanostructured “super surface” with superhydrophobic and superkilling properties

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
24 3 2015
Accepted
12 5 2015
First published
12 5 2015
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

RSC Adv., 2015,5, 44953-44959

Engineering a nanostructured “super surface” with superhydrophobic and superkilling properties

J. Hasan, S. Raj, L. Yadav and K. Chatterjee, RSC Adv., 2015, 5, 44953 DOI: 10.1039/C5RA05206H

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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