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Antiadhesive Bionic Combs for Handling of Nanofibers

Project description

Tiny combs inspired by spiders could untangle nanofibers and enhance application

Nanofibers are about 100 times smaller in diameter than a human hair. Their minuscule dimensions alone make them difficult to manipulate. Add to that their tendency to 'stick' to other materials and handling them becomes a nightmare, impeding development of the wealth of applications they promise. Nature has endowed a quirky little spider with a row of leg bristles like a miniature comb that the spider uses to comb out the strands of silk it produces. BioCombs4Nanofibers plans to develop a way to mimic this system on a man-made surface. Its careful characterisation could lead to novel nanotools that are anti-adhesive when it comes to nanofibers, opening the door to easier nanofiber processing and a myriad of nanofiber applications.

Objective

Challenge: Nanofibers are constantly drawing the attention of material scientists and engineers as their surface-to-used-material-ratio is beneficial for, e.g. medical applications. However, technical nanofiber processing, transportation or even simple things as spooling is inhibited by their attraction to any surface by van der Waals forces, the adhesive forces also enabling geckos to stick to the wall. Recent research aims for scale-up of the controllable production of nanofibers though have not enabled an easier handling and thus their application is still limited. A specific kind of nanofibers are nanofibrous protrusions of adherent cells and microorganisms. The interaction of these fibers with nanostructures is a key feature for their controlled adhesion at natural or artificial surfaces.

Inspiration by nature: One major problem for handling of nanofibers is their stickiness to almost any surface due to van der Waals forces. However, there is a biological example to show how to tackle this problem in the future: cribellate spiders bear a specialized comb, the calamistrum, to handle and process nanofibers, which are assembled to their structural complex capture threads. These 10 – 30 nm thick fibers do not stick to the calamistrum due to a special fingerprint-like nanostructure. This structure causes the nanofibers to not smoothly adapt to the surface of the calamistrum, but rather minimizes contact and thus reduce the adhesive forces between the nanofibers and the calamistrum.

Radically new technological approach: The transfer of these bionic comb structures to a technical surface will enable that future tools for nanofiber handling (covered with such a nanostructure) are antiadhesive towards nanofibers. Similar nanostructures can hinder the adhesion of nanofibrous protrusions of cells or microorganisms, which may enable cell-repellent or antiseptic areas on medical devices and implants.

Call for proposal

H2020-FETOPEN-2018-2020

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Sub call

H2020-FETOPEN-2018-2019-2020-01

Coordinator

UNIVERSITAT LINZ
Net EU contribution
€ 606 562,50
Address
Altenberger strasse 69
4040 Linz
Austria

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Region
Westösterreich Oberösterreich Linz-Wels
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost
€ 606 562,50

Participants (5)