Copying the small structures of Salvinia leaves

Several plants and animals have evolved surfaces with long-term (i.e., days to months) air-retainability to prevent wetting and submersion. One example is Salvinia, a plant floating on water. The secret “how do they maintain an air-mattress” has been unraveled by researchers.

Salvinia leaves and the eggbeater structures

Researchers at Jilin University reviewed recent progress in the study of Salvinia leaves and their artificial replicas. “Salvinia has complex multicellular hairs on the upper side of its leaves, and each group of four hairs is connected at the terminal ends, forming an eggbeater structure. The hairs are coated with hydrophobic wax crystals, while the patches at the terminal ends of the hairs lack wax crystals and are, therefore, hydrophilic. These features make the air-water interface more stable, exhibiting long-term air-retention ability,” says author Huichao Jin of Jilin University in Changchun, China.

Since the air-retention ability of Salvinia leaves was discovered, researchers began to fabricate artificial Salvinia leaves and investigated their potential applications. However, the complex eggbeater structures present a difficult challenge for traditional manufacturing methods. In the past decade, photolithography, direct laser lithography, chemical vapor deposition, electrodeposition, electrostatic flocking, 3D printing, chemical etching, and plasma etching recently have been developed for fabricating Salvinia-inspired structures. However, the complex structures make many of these techniques unable to replicate the fine structures. Although direct laser lithography and 3D printing techniques succeed in fabricating fine structures, they cannot fabricate the hydrophilic tips at the end of hairs. Therefore, it is still challenging to fabricate artificial Salvinia leaves.

The robust air-mattress in Salvinia structures acts as a physical barrier for water to reach the substrate. This inspires many engineering applications, including drag reduction, water harvesting, evaporation, and repellence, oil/water separation, and thermal insulation. These works are currently limited to early laboratory demonstrations. There are still challenges in the development of artificial surfaces suitable for the complexity and variability of the real environment.

Jin and his colleagues are exploring the potential of Salvinia structures in preventing medical bacterial infection. “The air-mattress acts as a physical barrier for water to approach the substrate, and it can also act as a physical barrier for preventing bacteria reach substrates,” says Jin. He points that traditional antibacterial surfaces involving antibiotics may cause drug resistance while the artificial Salvinia-inspired surfaces are free of antibiotics. Employing Salvinia structures to prevent medical bacterial infection may be a promising strategy.

Article details:
Jin et al., “Small structure, large effect: Functional surfaces inspired by Salvinia leaves” Small Structures (2021) https://doi.org/10.1002/sstr.202100079

Contact:
Dr. Huichao Jin
Jilin University
Email: jinhc@jlu.edu.cn

Press release distributed by Asia Research News for Jilin University.


Topic: Press release summary

Small town girl making big city woman dreams come alive, Robin Shockley Named Woman of the Year for 2021

We are excited to announce that our Extraordinary People Awards team selected Robin Shockley as the Woman of the Year for 2021. The prestigious award will be a televised event reaching millions through the airwaves in Atlanta, Georgia. 

Robin Shockley is the Founder of “Focus Forward with Robin”, which includes being a Columnist Writer for several magazines worldwide as well as she is a published Author of “Catching the Vision to Focus Forward” book and Author of over 60 inspiring faith based devotionals.  She is the PR Agent for RSGN Network and World Women Conference & Awards in Atlanta where she hosts her very own television show “Focus Forward with Robin“, allowing guests to share their stories from pit 2 purpose.  Also she is an active PR agent for GnG Productions in Hollywood which she provides promotional media and social media support through brand recognition. She is an Ambassador and Director for the Sports Karate Museum and Come On In Inc organizations, where she serves as an award presenter and humanitarian advocate along with being a domestic violence advocate too. As a Motivational Speaker since 2009 and new actress with film,  Robin’s purpose in life is being the link between the person who needs help and the person who can help. She motivates people to recognize their potential, purpose & passion for moving forward in life while living their best legacy today through serving others utilizing skills. She is the bridge maker that inspires individuals and small businesses to gain confidence to recognize the importance of stepping forward to make a difference now for future generations.

Honorees will be able to accept their prestigious award during the televised event and be seen by millions of viewers both globally and locally. In addition, this will be a memorable event as Dr. John Williams, the Host of Elite TV will be engaging with Red Carpet interviews on his show. This is an opportunity of a lifetime!

The registration for the fall awards will start on May 5th with limited seating. 

There will be opportunities to visit other sponsorship on the registration page: ExtraPeopleAwards

About laExpose’ Productions 

A 501c3 nonprofit organizations host Extraordinary People Awards annually.

Mission: A World where people will accept others diverse talents and help end poverty.

Vision: laExpose’ seek to educate, promote community service & eradicate poverty.  

Contact Details

Name: Dwayne Coley

Email: [email protected]

Tel. : 615-562-1532

Company: laExpose’ Productions

Country: USA

One Year Later, U.S. Small Businesses, Stores and Restaurants Reach 84% Recovery Rate, According to New Fivestars Data

. The breakdown of survey participants includes 284 men, 288 women, 6 non-binary, and 5 individuals preferring not to disclose. 

About Fivestars 
Fivestars is America’s largest local commerce network, driving over $3 billion of sales and 100 million transactions annually. Our mission is to help businesses and communities thrive by turning every transaction into a relationship. We offer vertically integrated payments, loyalty, and a marketing automation platform that brings more customers to local businesses. Founded in 2011, Fivestars is backed by Lightspeed, DCM, Menlo Ventures, HarbourVest, Salt Partners, and others. Together, let’s #LoveLocal. For more information visit: www.fivestars.com.
 

Small Town Canadian Water Store Thrives During Pandemic by Selling Online in Canada and USA


Midland, ON – During this third wave of the COVID-19 crisis, many traditional Canadian Retail Businesses have been hit hard due to forced closures to limit public access to their bricks and mortar stores. Every day we hear stories of the hardship being caused to those business owners and their families.

Water Store Midland, through it’s online stores, Water eStore in both Canada and the USA are providing contact-less replacement water filters, UV lights and even Reverse Osmosis Drinking Water Systems and Water Softeners shipped directly to the homeowner. “We have pivoted and focused on growing our online business to help families concerned about the safety, taste and smell of their water by providing the products and consumables for great water in their homes” said Gary Beutler, Owner and President Water Store Midland and Water eStore.

Gary’s YouTube Channel Gary The Water Guy has over 300 videos specifically made for the homeowner on water filtration. These videos help homeowners not only understand how their systems work but also how to install and maintain. The Gary the Water Guy YouTube channel is one of the largest water filtration channels in North America with the channel having over 22,000 subscribers, and Gary’s Videos have been viewed over 6,500,000 times and provided over 280,000 hours of help for the homeowner and their families for their water concerns.

“When homeowners are looking for a water filtration solution for their family, especially now during the Pandemic, they turn to the internet and find help in my YouTube videos” says Gary.

“The videos link to our ecommerce stores in both Canada and the USA where we provide free shipping and discount pricing, so the home owner knows where to get what they need to get the job done. Our product pages also have links to the videos and often home-owners return each year to review the videos before doing annual maintenance on their water filtration equipment for their families. We help families in both municipal and rural areas make sure their water is safe! At a time where families don’t want maintenance people coming to their homes, we show families how they can do it themselves and save money in the process.”

Gary says, “Before the pandemic we were busy and growing steadily but business has really boomed during the pandemic with so many families working from home or their cottage.”

The Water Store maintains it’s own warehouse but also uses warehouses through-out Canada and the USA to drop ship water filtration products to their customers as quickly as possible. Water Store ships daily coast to coast in Canada and USA.

Any homeowner with concerns about the safety, taste, smell, discolouration or staining caused by their water is invited to check out the online store at waterstore.ca or Gary’s YouTube Channel Gary The Water Guy

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About Water Store Midland


Water Store Midland is a family owned, private company run by Gary and Sheryl Beutler located in Midland, ON. Gary Beutler is a Certified Water Specialist and has been helping families with their water filtration for over 18 years. Both Sheryl and Gary each have over 40 years experience in Retail bricks and mortar retail business.

Small Wine Company, Takes Big Steps in Promoting COVID Vaccinations by Creating a New Party Theme, “Vaccibrations”

Pent up for months, people thirst to host parties again. With more and more people receiving their 2nd COVID vaccination, the Vaccibration (TM) is the new party trend.

The insight for this party theme came from a Connecticut mom of three who used it to promote her start-up wine e-commerce store, classwithsasswines.com.

“It started as a social campaign, consisting of fun ideas for party invites and games that I’d post to my followers. Once the name of the party theme came to me, it just took off. I’m bombarded daily with requests for hosting ideas and party decor suggestions,” said Amy, Founder of Class With Sass Wines.

“We all desperately want to host a social gathering, even a small one, but the stigma surrounding having an in person party still exists. A Vaccibration, solves that problem I think. It says, we want to get together, but we also want to be responsible about it.”

Class With Sass Wines LLC
Class With Sass Wines is a direct to consumer, privately owned wine and party decor e-commerce retailer. We offer unique and irreverent wine and decor for celebrations from birthdays to weddings to company events to proms and graduations and all holidays.