Mimicking Cacti Spines via Hierarchical Self‐Assembly for Water Collection and Unidirectional Transport

Abstract

Abstract Nature utilizes bottom‐up approaches to fabricate defined structures with highly complex, anisotropic and functional features. One prominent example is cacti spines, which exhibit a hierarchically structured conical morphology with a longitudinal microstructured surface. Here, a bottom‐up approach to fabricate supramolecular microstructured spines is presented by applying a self‐assembly protocol. Taking advantage of the capillary forces of vertically aligned polyamide microfibers acts as the structure‐directing substrate for site‐specific self‐assembly of a specific 1,3,5‐benzenetricarboxamides from the solution. The morphology of the supramolecular spines covers several hierarchical levels, ultimately resulting in a conical shape with longitudinal self‐assembled microgrooves and a superhydrophilic surface. It is demonstrated that these hierarchical conical microstructures are able to transport water droplets unidirectionally.

Keywords

• 1,3,5‐benzenetricarboxamides
• hierarchical self‐assembly
• polymer flock
• superhydrophilicity
• supramolecular conical microstructures
• water transport