Direct Pattern Transfer of the Surface Structures of Shark Skin onto Thermoplastic Polymers

Abstract:

Biomimetic surface structures have profound influences on the development of many emerging devices and systems. In this study, a sequential approach involving hot embossing and polymer casting for transferring biological surface structures to thermoplastic polymers were investigated and developed. The surface structure on shark skins (Carcharhinus brachyurous) was used as a case study. A PMMA pattern was fabricated by directly hot embossing the biological surface of the skin. The resulting PMMA structure was used as a casting master for rapid feature transfer onto PDMS surfaces. The replicated surface patterns on the polymer were found to be comparable with those on the shark skin. The water tunnel test of the flatplate sample pieces suggests that the drag reduction efficiency of the biomimetic shark-skin surface achieves 8.25% in maximum and 6.91% in average, which validates that this forming technology can be applied to the direct pattern transfer of the firm creatural scarfskins onto thermoplastic polymers.

• Periodical: Advanced Materials Research (Volumes 154-155)
• Pages: 658-662
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMR.154-155.658
• Online since: October 2010
• Authors: Xin Han, Juan Wang
• Keywords: Hot Embossing, Pattern Transfer, Polymer Casting, Shark Skin, Surface Structure

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