Electric-Field-Controlled Surface Instabilities in Soft Elastic Films

Arun, Narasimhan and Sharma, Ashutosh and Shenoy, Vijay B and Narayan, KS (2006) Electric-Field-Controlled Surface Instabilities in Soft Elastic Films. In: Advanced Materials, 18 (5). pp. 660-663.

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Abstract

Understanding morphological instabilities at soft interfaces is important in a variety of diverse problems, such as adhesion/debonding in polymer films [1] and biological cells, [2] friction,[3] cavitation, and patterning. [4] Non-specific interactions of electromagnetic origin play an important role in these instabilities. Spontaneous surface patterns appear in soft solid films that are in contact proximity (< 50 nm) with a rigid contactor (or another film) due to a competition between destabilizing van der Waals attractive force (between the film and the contactor) and the stabilizing elastic-strain energy. It is known that the wavelength of the pattern that appears depends only on the film thickness.[5–7] These instabilities, while profoundly influencing the adhesion/debonding characteristics, [8] also provide an attractive route to patterning and morphological control of soft thin films by external interactions. However, intermolecular interactions, being material properties, cannot be easily modulated. Moreover, these interactions are short-ranged and thus even nanometer-scale surface roughness and defects affect the robustness of these patterns.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Advanced Materials
Publisher:	WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
Additional Information:	The copyright belongs to Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
Keywords:	Polydimethylsiloxane;Surface patterning;Thin films;Microstructured;Thin films, polymer
Department/Centre:	Division of Mechanical Sciences > Chemical Engineering
Date Deposited:	20 Apr 2006
Last Modified:	22 Feb 2012 05:59
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/6369

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