Material Design for Ice Protection and Control

Fecha: 25 de Mayo de 2023.
Hora: 12:00 a 13:00.
Lugar: Aula A22 de la Facultad de Ciencias. 

Ponente: Dra. Irene Tagliaro (University of Milano-Bicocca).

Organiza el Grupo de Física de Fluidos y Biocoloides de la UGR.

The development of materials with controlled interactions with water and ice is a great challenge for both science and industry. The complex interactions at interfaces needed to be broken down to gain fundamental understanding, and often interdisciplinary approaches spanning from physics to chemistry to engineering are required.

Functional properties of surfaces against ice formation and adhesion involve the reduction of ice adhesion stress, the suppression of the nucleation temperature, or delay the freezing time, but also the promotion of liquid water removal from the surface by drop rebound or shedding before freezing. The exploitation of functional properties has inspired the development of different types of surfaces for controlling ice formation i.e. superhydrophobic surfaces, soft deformable materials, discontinuous surfaces, surfaces comprising a water liquid layer, and modified with anti-freeze proteins. In this seminar, different approaches for icephobic materials are presented in the frame of the project ITN-MSCA SURFICE (Smart surface design for efficient ice protection and control). This project which involves universities, research institutions, enterprises and partner organizations in 8 European countries (Italy, Germany, France, the UK, the Netherland, Belgium, Austria, Switzerland) has the ambition of leading to the formulation of a rational framework for the design and the fabrication of a category of icephobic surfaces.