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X. Di, X. Wang, C. Wang and Y. Li, Soft Matter, 2020, DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E.
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7 December 2017
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PAPER
Karsten Baumgarten and Brian P. Tighe
Viscous forces and bulk viscoelasticity near jamming
shall the Royal Society of Chemistry be held responsible for any errors
or omissions in this Accepted Manuscript or any consequences arising
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ARTICLE DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E

Fabrication of a Waterborne, Superhydrophobic, Self-Cleaning,

Highly Transparent and Stable Surface
Tinghan Yang†a, Meng Wang†a, Xin Wanga, Xin Dia, Chengyu Wang*a, Yudong Li*a

Superhydrophobic surfaces have received tremendous attention worldwide. However, the synthesis of a
superhydrophobic surface possessing two paradoxical characteristic properties — stability and transparency, is a vital
aspect that has been addressed in this paper. The surface was fabricated by an environmentally friendly process, which

Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript

used distilled water for dissolution of SiO2 nanoparticles in the presence of surfactants, instead of organic solvents.
Moreover, the surface was transparent and had self-cleaning property and stability. The optimal balance of roughness and
multi-porous structure imparted excellent transparency to this surface. Importantly, both the conformal coating and the
SiO2 nanoparticles embedded in the half solidified conformal coating contributed to the excellent stability, thus
overcoming the paradox. The surface could withstand a temperature of 150 °C for 24 h and also different temperature
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regimes between 0-200 °C for 2 h. In addition, this surface could resist repeated scratches and abrasion as well as strong
acids and alkali. The surface achieved self-cleaning ability due to the introduction of surfactants containing F element. This
simple but novel strategy and surface had the advantages of high safety, low cost and environmental-friendliness.

1. Introduction
Superhydrophobic surfaces possessing significant water repellency
have gained tremendous interest, owing to their numerous
applications and outstanding properties, such as self-cleaning, anti-
corrosion, oil-water separation, and so forth.1-6 Among these, wear
resistance is an important feature of superhydrophobic surface.
Recently, the focus was on preparing superhydrophobic materials
possessing multiple features and catering to the needs of the
society, has become very desirable. Several approaches like etching
technique,7,8 template-based method,9,10 vapour deposition, and
sol-gel process11 have been proposed for the preparation of unique
and novel superhydrophobic structures with strong wear resistance.
However, these techniques require special equipment, rigorous
conditions, and tedious processes for most of the preparation
methods. Some common techniques are restricted to smaller
surfaces or substrates, which are made of specific materials.12
Therefore, a simple and safe method, spray coating, was applied for
the fabrication of superhydrophobic surface. Particularly, materials
with special micro- and nano-structures and low surface energy are
the two important factors influencing the constructing of a
superhydrophobic structure.13-15
In addition, this method simply introduces nanoparticles to
construct a rough structure and improves the bonding performance
between the substrate and compounds with low surface energy.
This makes the nanoparticles, modified by hydrophobic groups,
stick to the surfaces. These are the two vital factors for improving
the durability of superhydrophobic surface. Nevertheless, this is
limited to the forces acting between the molecules that make up
the surface, which makes it difficult to repair the damaged surface
morphology.16-18 Moreover, some techniques for improving wear
resistance can destroy the inherent properties of substrates, and so
that this material cannot be applied to other aspects.19 Finally,
superhydrophobic surfaces can be damaged by violent or repeated
abrasion, regardless of how strong and durable they are. A stable,
economical, and environmentally friendly material such as tape,
which can be prepared by simple technology, can easily stick on any
surface as a base in the fabrication of a robust superhydrophobic
material. This is a promising strategy to solve the problem of low
durability.20-22
In addition to wear resistance, it is necessary to endow the
surface with transparency and self-cleaning properties. However,
transparency compromises with stability, which is also an important
property for superhydrophobic surface.23 Transparent
superhydrophobic surface coatings with short life cycles are widely
used in our day-to-day life, such as windshields, windows, solar
panels, goggles, etc.24,25 Nevertheless, achieving transparency and
abrasion-resistance in a superhydrophobic surface simultaneously is
still a challenge due to competition between surface roughness and
transparency.26 Moreover, self-cleaning property is very important
for a superhydrophobic surface. A superhydrophobic surface
material with stability, transparency, and self-cleaning ability can be
widely used in modern day life. For instance, the self-cleaning
property enables the surface with high transparency to be cleaned
quickly and thoroughly, when stained by contaminants. Therefore,

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it is necessary to combine self-cleaning property with transparency
while preparing superhydrophobic materials.
Nanoparticles are common raw materials for construction of
superhydrophobic surfaces. Generally, superhydrophobic surfaces
are prepared by dissolving hydrophobic nanoparticles in organic
solvents such as acetone, ethyl alcohol, toluene, or other organic
solvents. However, these organic solvents owing to their
bioaccumulation property, have potentially adverse effects on
offsprings,27 such as increased risk of serious medical, neurological,
and neuropsychological impairments. Also, considering the
environmental issues, use of water as solvent for the nanoparticles
is preferable in the fabrication of superhydrophobic transparent
surface. Furthermore, this surface is safe, environmentally friendly,
and economical. Also, it would be irreplaceable if this product is
applied in reality.28
In this work, taking into consideration the important aspects of
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environmental friendliness, self-cleaning property, combination of
outstanding, robust, and transparent properties, superhydrophobic
surfaces were fabricated by spraying aqueous dispersion of silica
nanoparticles (instead of organic solvents), onto the double-faced
transparent tape (3M), which was covered by a layer of conformal
coating (Ausbond 92), to enhance the stability. Spraying was a facile
method than spin-coating, etching, etc., and was more convenient
in actual applications. Moreover, the suspension of SiO2
nanoparticles can be employed whenever necessary, can maintain
the homogeneous state for a prolonged period, due to the
introduction of surfactants (FS-3100 and FAS) with fluoroalkyl
groups, which possess strong affinity towards hydrophobic
nanoparticles. It provides an effective and cheap method for simple
industrial production.
2. Experimental
2.1. Materials
1H,1H,2H,2H-perfluorodecyltrimethoxysilane (C13H13F17SiO3, FAS, ≥
97%) was purchased from Quzhou Dongming Chemical Industry Co.
Ltd. Hydrophobic silica nanoparticles (7-40nm in diameter) were
purchased from Aladdin. Dupont capstone®FS-3100 surfactant ( ≥
99.9%) was procured from Jianbang Chemical Industry Co. Ltd.,
Shanghai, China. Ausbond 92 conformal coating was purchased
from AUSBOND (CHINA) Resin Manufacturing Industry Co. Ltd.
Distilled water was prepared in our laboratory using water
purification machine from Zhongyang Yongkang Environmental
Science and Technology Ltd. The 3M double-faced transparent tape
(3M VHB-4910) was purchased from 3M Co. Ltd., Shenzhen, China.
All chemicals were used as received.
2.2. Fabrication of water-borne superhydrophobic suspension.
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In a typical procedure, hydrophobic silica (1.5 g) was added
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DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E
distilled water (100 mL) in a bottle. Then, FS-3100 surfactant (0.6 g)
added to the bottle. The bottle was violently shaken to disperse the
hydrophobic silica nanoparticles in the water. Then, the bottle was
placed on an ultrasonic shaker for 30 min. The bottle was later
transferred to an ultrasonic cell crusher from the ultrasonic shaker
and kept for 20 minutes until the nanoparticles were totally
dispersed in the suspension. Finally, FAS (1.5 mL) was poured into
the bottle slowly and stirred constantly at 1000 rpm for 24 h.
2.3. Fabrication of water-borne superhydrophobic transparent
robust surface
Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript
The 3M transparent double-faced tape was first stuck onto the
cleaned glass substrate. Then, a ZBQ four-sided wet-film
preparation device was used to scrape the layer of Ausbond 92
conformal coating on the transparent double-faced tape (3M).
Next, the water-borne superhydrophobic suspension was sprayed
using a spray gun with 0.7 MPa pressure and the distance between
spray gun and substrate was 10-20 cm and the painting was 200
layers thick. Finally, the sample was maintained at room
temperature for 24 h and dried under natural conditions.
2.4. Characterizations
Details of characterization methods are shown in the
Supplementary Information.
2.5. Property testing
2.5.1. Characterizations of superhydrophobic property of the
surface
The water contact angles (WCA) of the superhydrophobic surfaces
were measured using an OCA20 system (Data-physics, Germany).
The sliding angles (SA) on the surfaces were measured using a
JC2000C contact angle system, supplied by Shanghai Zhongchen
Digital Technic Apparatus Co. Ltd. (Shanghai, China). In obtain
accurate WCA readings and SA, 3 points on the superhydrophobic
surfaces of each specimen were tested and the mean value was
calculated. The size of water droplet used in the tests was 5 μL and
both the tests were performed at room temperature. Moreover,
principle of contact angle measurement should be consistent with
the Cassie-Baxter model, the equation of which is as follows:29
cos 𝜃𝑐 = 𝑓(cos 𝜃𝑜 + 1) ―1 (1)
In this equation, 𝜃𝑜 is the intrinsic contact angle, whereas 𝜃𝑐
is the apparent contact angle.
2.5.2. Test for scratching by knife
A common knife was used to scrape the surface vigorously until
some scratches appeared on the surfaces.
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2.5.3. Test for thermostability nanoparticles and endow the silica particles with
View Article Online
DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E
The superhydrophobic surface was maintained at 20-200 °C for two superhydrophobicity.
hours and also at 150 °C for 2-24 h.
2.5.4. Test for abrasion using sandpaper
The surface was abraded using 150 grit sandpaper, loaded with a
weight of 50 g. In addition, the wear distance was 10 cm each time.
2.5.5. Test for resistance against strong acid and alkali
After the surface was immersed in the solution with pH from 2 to
12 for 24 h, the surface was rinsed with water (5 times) until the
solution was completely washed away and then it was dried at
room temperature.
Fig.2 Morphology and topography of this surface. (a) Low-resolution SEM
image of the surface. (b) High-resolution SEM image of the surface. (c) SEM

Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript

image of cross section of surface. (d) High-resolution SEM image of the cross
3. Results and discussion section of surface. (e) AFM 2D image of surface. (f) AFM 3D image of
surface.
3.1. Preparation of the surface and characterization

In Figs. 2a and 2b, the low and high magnification SEM images of
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the prepared surface showed hierarchical porous and clustered-like

state. It indicated that the superhydrophobic silica nanoparticles
aggregated together in the waterborne suspension, due to the
hydroxyl groups on hydrolysed SiO2 particles and hydrolysed FAS,
thus enhancing the particle-to-particle bond strength. This was
because the smaller pores in the hierarchical porous structure were
occupied by secondary particles.31,32 This porous and irregular
rough structure was able to impart excellent superhydrophobic
Fig.1. Schematic illustration for preparation of the surface and treatment of properties to the surface.
the coating.
Fig. 2c showed that some functional silica nanoparticles were
stuck to the conformal coating and many nanoparticles were
The method for fabricating the waterborne hydrophobic silica
partially immersed in the conformal coating, since the conformal
nanoparticle suspension and its spray coating process are illustrated
coating layer was in a partly solidified state. As Fig. 2d shows, due
in Fig. 1. Initially, a layer of 3M double-faced transparent adhesive
to prolonged time, the nanoparticles were slowly immersed in the
tape was pasted on the glass substrate. Then the layer of
conformal coating under capillary dragging, which was driven by the
Ausbond92 conformal coating on the double-faced adhesive tape
differences in surface free energy between the silica nanoparticles
was strapped with a four-corner coater. Finally, the well-dispersed
and conformal coating.33 This partial solidification method could
aqueous silica solution was sprayed on the scrapped conformal
make the superhydrophobic surface more robust. Furthermore, the
coating.
topographies and surface roughnesses of these superhydrophobic
The silica nanoparticles with small particle sizes ranging between
surfaces were studied by AFM. AFM images revealed that the
7-40 nm, could decrease the Mie scattering.30 FAS was used for
surface possessed specifically cluster-like rough structures (Fig. 2e).
binding together the adjacent silica nanoparticles. It also helped in
Besides, the 3D AFM image in Fig. 2f showed the average roughness
grafting of hydrophobic groups onto functional hydrophobic silica
to be 165 nm and root-mean-square roughness was 214 nm.
nanoparticles, in order to lower the surface energies of the
Considering rapid evaporation of solvent during spraying, the
particles. Thus, the hydrophobic nanoparticles were converted to
formation of hierarchical porous characteristics could be
superhydrophobic nanoparticles, endowing the sprayed layer with
explained.34 Therefore, the hierarchical porous surface with cluster-
superhydrophobicity. Besides, the FS-3100 surfactant played a vital
like structures, possessing a superb superhydrophobicity, was
role in the suspension, by enabling the ready dispersion of the
obtained.
hydrophobic silica particles in distilled water. Moreover, the two
The BET analysis gave the same conclusion that the surface
surfactants could bond with each other and with SiO2 nanoparticles
already possessed a hierarchical porous structure, formed by silica
to form a network structure. Meanwhile, the hydrophobic groups in
nanoparticles linked with each other through covalent bonds. These
FS-3100 surfactant could also be grafted onto the hydrophobic silica
bonds were formed between the hydroxyl groups during the

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hydrolysis of silica nanoparticles with hydrolysed FAS and FS-3100.
The BET image revealed that both, the original silica nanoparticles
and modified silica exhibited hysteresis at relatively high P/P0
(Fig.S1a and S1b). The hysteresis loop is related to capillary
condensation and evaporation of mesopores, and the step of P/P0>
0.9 indicated that the macropores were filled.35 Besides, the pore
size distribution of the sample as shown in the image also
illustrated that samples had hierarchically porous structure ranging
almost from 10-100 nm. After modification, the specific surface
area decreased from 280.3 to 106.7 m2 g-1. Nevertheless, the
average pore size of the sample increased from 12.77 to 23.28 nm.
These results point to the fact that after the formation of
hierarchical porous structure, some small pores within were
occupied by some secondary particles after modification. This was
consistent with the results of SEM and AFM analysis, indicating that
this surface has excellent anti-wetting property.
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Fig. 3 (a) XPS survey and high resolution F1s, Si2p, and C1s spectra of the
surface. (b) SEM image and the mapping of C, Si, O, F element
X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy was used to analyse the
chemical components of the coating. The F1s, Si2p, C1s spectra are
shown in Fig. 3a. Peaks at 103.79 and 101.7 eV in Si2p spectrum
were originally from the hydrophobic SiO2 nanoparticles, whereas
the appearance of peak at 102.2 eV showed that the Si-C group
appeared due to addition of FAS to the solvent. In the C1s spectrum,
peaks at 284.78 eV, 286.88 eV and 289.38 eV indicated that the C-C,
C-O and C=O groups were derived from FAS and FS-3100 surfactant.
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In the F1s spectrum, the peak at 689.33 eV was attributed to Online
View Article the -
DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E
CF3 and -CF2 groups in FAS and FS-3100. In addition, the EDS
spectrogram in Fig. 3b showed that the main elements of this
coating were C, O, Si and F, This indicated that FAS and FS-3100
dissolved fully in aqueous medium to form a stable aqueous
solution. FAS and FS-3100 were completely grafted onto the
hydrophobic silica nanoparticles. Moreover, the infrared spectrum
of modified SiO2 nanoparticles (Fig.S2) showed a peak at 1200 cm-1.
However, this peak was absent in the spectrum of original SiO2
nanoparticles. This proved that the C-F bond was present in
modified SiO2 nanoparticles and this result was consistent with the
XPS and EDS results. By combining these results with the
Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript
conclusions of FITR, XPS and EDS analyses, it became clear that the
surfactant was successfully grafted onto the SiO2 nanoparticles,
which could impart superhydrophobic property to the surface.
3.2. Water-repelling property
Fig. 4 (a) The water contact angle of this surface. (b) The contact angle of
bare conformal coating. (c-f) Schematic shows no water adhesion with the
surface. (g) Silver mirror reaction on superhydrophobic surface irradiated by
sunlight.
The glass substrate, sprayed by suspension possess, showed
excellent superhydrophobicity. From Fig. 4a it was evident from
contact angle measurements that the randomly dropped 5μL
distilled water droplet on the substrate was nearly spherical in
shape, with contact angle of 156.1o, whereas the sliding angle was
nearly 2o. It indicated that the sprayed coating surface possessed
outstanding superhydrophobicity. The rough fractal like structure
and low surface energy groups of FAS and FS-3100 impart this
property to the coating surface obtained by spraying. In addition,
Fig. 4b showed the contact angle of the bare Ausbond 92 conformal
coating was 96.2o on the surface, based on the equation mentioned
in characterization methods. Combining this with the contact angle
of superhydrophobic surface, the contact area between the water
droplet and surface was determined as 9.69%. Hence, the area of
the water and the air pocket was 90.31%. This showed that the
superhydrophobic surface in this study possessed excellent water-
repelling property. Furthermore, from Figs. 4(c-f), when the water
droplet from needle contacted the surface, it maintained its
spherical shape and did not adhere to the surface. Moreover, the
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droplet could be easily picked up by a dropper after contacting the
surface, without any loss and adhesion, which indicated that the
surface possessed excellent superhydrophobicity. Besides, from Fig.
4g, the silver mirror phenomenon that occurred on this
superhydrophobic surface in water. This meant that the surface
possessed certain degree of rough porous structure, with air
pockets in the middle of this rough porous structure. Therefore, the
sunshine passing through the water to its surface was completely
reflected back from the surface, which led to the occurrence of the
silver mirror phenomenon
3.3. Transparent property
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Fig. 5 (a) The tranmittance of superhydrophobic surface and bare glass and
the state of waterdroplets in bare glass and superhydrophobic surface.(b)
The transmittance of superhydrophobic surface corresponding to different
spraying thickness.
Another important aspect, optical property, deserves discussion.
Based on the UV/Vis transmittance spectra in Fig. 5a, the
superhydrophobic surface showed 91.6% transmittance
wavelength of 400 nm and transmittance of 91.5% at 550 nm. The
bare glass is used as substrate due to the high transmittance of 93%
at 550 nm, the transmittance of prepared surface decreased by
1.5% at 550 nm. This result suggested that the surface with high
transmittance could be obtained by the spray coating method. In
addition, in Fig. 5a, anhydrous copper sulphate-dyed water droplets
on the superhydrophobic surface and untreated surface, revealed
that droplets on superhydrophobic surface retained their spherical
state. In contrast, water droplets on the untreated surface failed to
retain the spherical shape, which indicated that this surface
possessed excellent superhydrophobicity. Moreover, the alphabets
beneath the superhydrophobic surface were clearly visible; hence,
it was obvious that this superhydrophobic surface had excellent
transparency. Which also verified the fact that
superhydrophobic surface displayed excellent transmittance in the
band region, visible to the human eye.
From the Fig.5b, it indicated that with the increase of coating
surface thickness, the transmittance of coating decreased from 90%
to 70%, this is because with the increase of thickness, the surface
changed from transparent to white, according to the Lambert-Beer
law:
𝒜 = 𝒦bc
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ARTICLE
𝒜 is absorbance, 𝒦is absorptivity, b is thickness, c is
View Article Online
DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E
concentration, 𝒦 and c are constant in the same surface, it can be
known by formula, with the increase of thickness, the absorbance
of the surface increases. Therefore, when the light passed through
the much thicker surface, the light would be absorbed by surface
and thus unable to pass through the surface. But when the
thickness ranged from 10-95μm, the light transmittance of the
coating surface hardly decreased, explain that the thickness range
from 10-95μm were the ideal state with better light transmittance.
Generally speaking, transparency and superhydrophobicty are
properties that contradict each other. Specifically, with increase in
roughness the superhydrophobicity of the surface increases
Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript
concomitantly. However, as a general rule, excessive increase of
roughness leads to decrease in transparency. Nevertheless,
appropriate roughness is required to maintain both transparency
and superhydrophobicity. In Fig.S4, the layers sprayed surface
roughness increased with the increasing of sprayed layers from 120-
200 layers, combine with Fig.5b, Tab.S1, explaining that even if the
surface roughness was increased in an appropriate range, the
transmittance of the material surface did not change much,
however, when the layer was change from 200 to 220, the
transmittance decreased from 90% to 75%, explaining that 200
layers is just the best state for the combination of transparency and
superhydrophobic. Therefore, the optimum surface roughness
corresponding to the surface should be the roughness achieved by
at spraying 200 layers. In this article, the roughness of the
superhydrophobic surface was smaller than the wavelengths of
visible light, which indicated that the light scattering effect
decreased.5
3.4. Stability of the surface
Herein, the stability of the superhydrophobic surfaces was
demonstrated by determining the damages to the surface via
various methods. The knife scrape method was used to test the
stability of this surface. From the Figs.6(a-c), the surface was
vigorously scraped with a knife until some scratches appeared on
the surface. This surface retained its superhydrophobicity, which
indicated that the surface possessed superhydrophobicity, in spite
of the scratches. Meanwhile, since the superhydrophobic surface
this
used 3M transparent tape as the base, the transparent tape at the
incision had the tendency to expand along both sides of the incision
due to the inertia of maintaining its original state. This resulted in
folds on the superhydrophobic surface, which further strengthened
the rough structure of the superhydrophobic surface. Therefore,
even if the superhydrophobic surface suffered from the knife-
scratch damage, the superhydrophobic surface could still maintain
excellent superhydrophobicity.
(2)
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Fig. 6 Stability of this surface: (a-b) The process of scrapping the surface with
knife and test for superhydrophobic property using water. (c) The SEM
image of the surface after knife scrap. (d) Water-droplets on the surface,
contact angle of this surface was 150.4o and the sliding angleOnline
View Article was
DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E
4.8o. It indicated that this surface possessed excellent wear
resistance due to the SiO2 nanoparticles embedded in conformal
coating and the buffering effect of the 3M transparent tape. When
the surface was exposed to external wear, particles that are not
embedded in the conformal coating would be first rub off on the
surface, when the particles on the surface are almost completely
rubbed off, the particles stuck to and embedded in the conformal
coating along with folds would form a strong protective layer, this
protective layer prevented the surface from being damaged even
when it was rubbed many times by sandpaper, this is the reason of
this surface could effectively resist external force.36,37

Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript

treated with strong acid and strong alkali.
3.5. Self-cleansing properties
The superhydrophobic surface also possessed the ability to
resist corrosion due to strong acid and alkali. From Fig. 6d shows
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that the water droplets on the surface that was corroded by strong
acid or strong alkali also retained their spherical shape, in addition,
from Fig. S5a, the changes in contact angle and sliding angle were
not large, even under extreme conditions of pH = 2, 12. The CA was
still higher (nearly 150 o), and the highest SA was nearly 5 o, which
indicated that this surface was able to resist strong acid or strong
alkali treatment. The reason for this phenomenon is the substances
that made up this surface possess well ability to resist strong acid
and alkali, moreover, rough structure and low surface energy
substance on the surface could prevent this aqueous acid-based Figs. 7 Self-cleaning process on the superhydrophobic glass surface: (a)
solution immersed into the surface, make the material have the Carbon dust on transparent superhydrophobic surface (b) Water droplets
just started to drip on the surface (c) Water droplets gradually remove
effect of strong acid and alkali resistance.
carbon dust from the surface (d) Carbon dust was completely removed from
Thermostability of the water-repelling surface is an important the surface
index for evaluation of environmental adaptability under extreme
conditions of superhydrophobicity. In Fig.S5b, the trend of contact
angles and sliding angles under the test conditions of 20-200 °C and
two hours at each temperature can be seen, the CA was still higher
(nearly 150 o), and the highest SA was nearly 5 o, indicated that the
superhydrophobic surface retained its excellent superhydrophobic
performance and also showed that the surface possessed excellent
thermal fatigue resistance. It suggested that the
superhydrophobicity was steady before heating at 200°C. In
addition, the superhydrophobic surfaces were maintained at 150 °C
for 2-24 h and it was observed that the heat treatment time hardly
had any influence. From Fig.S5c, it was evident that the
superhydrophobic surface could maintain its superhydrophobic
properties even at high temperature for a long time. Fig. 8 Liquids (tea, orange juice, milk, and coffee) dropped on the
superhydrophobic surface (red arrow) and bare glass (blue arrows)
The surface was abraded with 150 grit sandpaper and loaded
with a weight of 50 g, in addition to the wear distance of 10 cm as
Practical applicability is the ultimate goal of the
each time. From Fig.S3, which showed the diagrammatic sketch of
superhydrophobic surface. Contaminants including dust, industrial
this test, and from Fig.S5d conclusion could be drawn that along
waste water and crude oil can contaminate the protective surface
with increase in abrasion time, after 12 times of abrasion, the
at any time.32,38-40 In actual outdoor environment, the surface

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Tab.1 Comparison of super-hydrophobic transparent surfaces prepared in this paper and other recently published literatures.
View Article Online
DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E
Materials Contact angle (o) Transmittance (%) Stability
SiO2, FS-3100, 3M tape, excellent scratch and abrasion resistance,
156.1 91.5
Ausbond 92 coating thermostability, strong acid and alkali resistance
PDMS, CaCO343 110.0 85 low
fluorinated silica multi-walled
159.0 75 low
carbon nanotubes44
Polydimethylsiloxane45 103.9 86.96 low
Teflon AF-2400,
152.0 95 low
indium tin oxide46
hexade-cyltrimethoxy silane, possessed strong acid and alkali resistance and
155.0 80
ZnO47 well thermostability

Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript

Triethoxyoctylsilane,
162.0 91.8 low
nano-silica48
n-propyltrichlorosilane
possessed strong acid and alkali resistance and
methyltrichlorosilane, low 91
well thermostability.
silicone oil49
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silica nanowires, fused silica
158.0 91
plates50
coating could be polluted by the surrounding dust and all kinds of
pollutants, which would deteriorate the performance of the
coating. Especially a transparent surface coating requires a lot of
money to maintain its high transparency. Therefore, in order to
prevent pollution of the surface, a transparent self-cleaning coating
is urgently required.41 From Figs.7(a-d), some carbon dust particles
were sprinkled on the transparent glass surface with an inclination
angle of 8°. When the water droplets were sprayed by a dropper
immediately on the surface, water droplets slid from the surface
flushing the dust particles away. Thereafter, the surface returned to
its original transparent state, owing to its superhydrophobicity with
low surface energy and micro-nano structures, as well as the low
adhesivity of dust particles with the surface. In addition, from Fig.8,
the liquid droplets such as fruit juice, milk, or coffee can
accidentally spill on this superhydrophobic surface. Fig. 8 showed
that these liquids retained their spherical shape on the
superhydrophobic surface.
Moreover, these surfaces possessed the ability to repel muddy
water. From Fig.S6 (a-d), it was evident that when the muddy water
droplets fell on the surface, the droplets failed to adhere to the
surface and rolled-off smoothly from the surface. This suggested
that these self-cleaning and antifouling properties towards carbon
dust and muddy water are remarkable.
Some superhydrophobic surfaces are prone to contamination by
oil due to their excellent superhydrophobic property and the
surface tension of the oil is lower than that of water,42 leading to
the penetration of oil through the surfaces. Herein, the fabricated
superhydrophobic surface possessed the ability to clean up the oil
pollutants, when oil contaminated the superhydrophobic surface. In
possessed strong acid and alkali resistance and
well thermostability.
clean oil pollution experiments, as shown in Fig.S7 (a-d), oil
(hexane) contaminated the superhydrophobic surface. Then,
distilled water was let over the surface slowly. It was evident that
the oil rolled down from the surface with water droplets. This
indicated that the surface possessed the property of cleaning-up
the oil pollution, owing to the rough nature of the
superhydrophobic surface, which resembled the synaptic structure
of the lotus leaf. On the superhydrophobic surface, due to surface
tension and air resistance between mastoids, the surface of water
tends to shrink into spheres and roll down, thus achieving self-
cleaning effect.
In order to reflect the advantages of the transparent
superhydrophobic surface prepared in this article, a comparison
with other recently published literatures was listed in Table 1. By
comparison, the surface we prepared possessed lots of advantages
indeed.
From this article, a surface possessing superhydrophobicity,
transparency, stability and self-cleaning property was fabricated
using waterborne solution spray on a conformal coating stuck to a
double-faced tape. The multifunctional superhydrophobic surface
made by this simple and environment-friendly method can be used
in wide range of practical applications and some waterproof
objects.
4. Conclusions
In summary, a stable multi-functional surface with
superhydrophobicity, transparency and self-cleaning properties has
been prepared by dispersing hydrophobic silica nanoparticles in

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ARTICLE
aqueous solution and spraying it on an Ausbond 92 conformal
coating that was strapped onto a 3M double-faced transparent
tape. The process for preparation of this surface is environmentally-
safe, does not require high temperature curing and uses nontoxic
and inexpensive raw materials. The superhydrophobic and
transparent surface showed clustered nanoporous structure.
Moreover, the prepared surface showed high transmittance
(91.5%), owing to its moderate hierarchical porous structure. The
surface exhibited self-cleaning property in presence of oil (hexane)
or dust (carbon dust) and antifouling performance towards muddy
water, coffee and orange juice. Most importantly, the surface also
possessed stability and friction resistance against external forces.
Even when the surface was abraded by sandpaper, it could still
retain its excellent superhydrophobicity. Owing to the properties
mentioned above, the prepared multifunctional surface with
transparency, self-cleaning property, superhydrophobicity and
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stability had high potential applications.
Conflicts of interest
There are no conflicts to declare
Acknowledgements
This research was supported by the National Natural Science
Foundation of China (31822008, 31770605) and the Outstanding
Youth Foundation of Heilongjiang (Grant no. JC2018006).
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Soft Matter
DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02473E
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Soft Matter Accepted Manuscript