Air Bubble Bursting Effect of Lotus Leaf

Abstract

In this paper, a phenomenon of air bubbles quickly bursting within several milliseconds on a "self-cleaning" lotus leaf was described. This observation prompted the synthesis of artificial surfaces similar to that of the lotus leaf. The artificial leaf surfaces, prepared by photolithography and wet etching, showed a similar air bubble bursting effect. Smooth and rough silicon surfaces with an ordered nanostructure or patterned microstructure were utilized to study the contribution of the micro/nano hierarchical structures to this phenomenon of air bubble bursting. Air bubbles were found to burst on some superhydrophobic surfaces with microstructure (within 220 ms). However, air bubbles burst much more rapidly (within 13 ms) on similar surfaces with micro/nanostructure. The height, width, and spacing of hierarchical structures could also affect air bubble bursting, and the effect of the height was more obvious. When the height of hierarchical structures was around the height found in natural lotus papillae, the width and spacing were significant for air bubble bursting. An original model was proposed to further evaluate the reason why the micro/nano hierarchical rough structures had an excellent air bubble bursting effect, and the validity of the model was theoretically demonstrated.