Fractal Surface Recovery And Self-Healing Contributed To Sustainable Superhydrophobicity: A Review

The concept of superhydrophobicity has been widely used after years of theoretical and experimental exploration. Researchers have obtained materials with excellent surface superhydrophobicity for numerous areas (e.g. textiles, paints, and coatings industries), through different design and synthesis methods using low surface energy components (LSECs) and micro/nanohierarchy composite structures. However, the durability of superhydrophobic material surfaces has gradually become a prominent obstacle to restricting applications. In this paper, advances in improving the durability of superhydrophobic surfaces in the past decade are reviewed, covering different schemes for recovering fractal surfaces based on the LSECs and micro/nanocomposite structures. It also presents a balanced review on wet chemical methods, chemical vapor deposition (CVD), layer-by-layer (LbL), microarc oxidation (MAO), and self-healing of the fractal surfaces, with the aim at developing sustainable superhydrophobicity. In addition, it innovatively summarized the research on the synthesis of self-healing superhydrophobic materials by machine learning methods. By the end it discusses perspectives on future development in this emerging research area.