Exploiting the solid-liquid interface

The interaction of liquids with solids is fundamental to many areas of science and engineering. On a wet day we need coats to keep dry, windscreen wipers to see and reservoirs to collect water and keep us alive. Our cars need oil to lubricate their engines, our ships need hulls that reduce drag and our planes need wings that limit ice formation. Many biological systems shrivel and dry without a liquid environment. The soil in our environment erodes as it rains and becomes contaminated when oil spillages occur. Nature has learnt to control water in a myriad of ways. The Lotus leaf cleanses itself of dust when it rains, a beetle in the desert collects drinking water from an early morning fog and some spiders walk on water. We understand so little of how to mimic the adaptations to water that nature has evolved, but if we did, we could design intelligent surfaces to retain or shed liquids at will. We could create better clothes, windscreens, pipes and miniature bio-chemical factories and diagnostic systems on the size of a credit card. That is the intention of this Platform grant. Not to focus on a single industrial sector or application, but rather to exploit one of the basic interactions in nature. To do so we will take basic research funded by research councils and industry, and add value by developing blue-skies research of relevance to a wide range of areas, such as water sports, sperm motility, microarray technology and electro-optical devices. This will be achieved by underpinning key interdisciplinary skills, providing flexibility for research staff to engage in ground-breaking projects, whilst maintaining contract continuity, and by integrating and training new researchers to the group.