Nanopattern transfer and wettability modification of regularly structured metallic and polymeric surfaces with...

The hexagonally arranged close-packed concave nanotexture of the master surface of nanoporous alumina has been imprinted several times on aluminum films and gold films by thermal evaporation and on polystyrene films by spin coating. The degradation of the nanotextures with replica pattern transfer has been monitored by measuring the topology and the wettability of duplicated films. The trough-to-crest height of the topography decreases while the wettability of the nanotexture increases significantly as replication goes on. Air fractions calculated with measured water contact angles decrease substantially with replication although they also depend strongly on the materials and the shapes of duplicating nanotextures.