Sustainability of superhydrophobicity under pressure

Prior studies have demonstrated that superhydrophobicity of submerged surfaces is influenced by hydrostatic pressure and other environmental effects. Sustainability of a superhydrophobic surface could be characterized by both how long it maintains the trapped air in its surface pores, so-called longevity, and the pressure beyond which it undergoes a global wetting transition, so-called terminal pressure. In this work, we investigate the effects of pressure on the performance of electrospun polystyrene fibrous coatings. The time-dependent hydrophobicity of the submerged coating in a pressure vessel is optically measured under elevated pressures. Rheological studies are also performed to determine the effects of pressure on drag reduction and slip length. The measurements indicate that surface longevity exponentially decays with increasing pressure in perfect agreement with the studies reported in the literature at lower pressures. It is found, however, that fibrous coatings could resist hydrostatic pressures significantly higher than those of previously reported surfaces. Our observations indicate that superhydrophobic fibrous coatings could potentially be used for underwater applications. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4766200]