Enhancing Anti-Icing Performance of Sensors with Thermoresponsive-Superhydrophobic Hybrid Surfaces

Abstract

Ice accumulation on the sensors operating under low temperatures degrades sensing performance, resulting in the deterioration of data reliability. Although the superhydrophobic surfaces enable excellent freezing delay, it impedes droplet evaporation in the deicing process for full-drying. For enhancing the deicing performance while maintaining the anti-icing capabilities, diverse strategies should be considered and investigated. Recently, the hybrid wettability surfaces have been highlighted due to their excellent deicing performance with minimal sacrifice in the freezing delay. Herein, we discuss the anti-icing characteristics of hybrid surfaces which have stripe patterns with superhydrophobic and thermoresponsive zones. In low temperature, the thermoresponsive zone shows hydrophobicity(142°) and changes to hydrophilic(65°) at high temperature. The hybrid surfaces are successfully fabricated by coating two different layers on the roughened surfaces. The fabricated surfaces show excellent freezing delay capability exhibiting a frost density of 150.6 kg/m3 similar to that of the superhydrophobic surfaces. Furthermore, they improve deicing characteristics by reducing deicing time by 57.1% compared to the superhydrophobic surfaces upon the changes in the wettability of the thermoresponsive region.