New material could make aircraft de-icers a thing of the past

Instead of applying a de-icing agent to strip ice from an aircraft’s wings before stormy winter takeoffs, airport personnel could, in the future, just watch chunks slide right off without lifting a finger.

Scientists report they have developed a liquid-like substance that can make wings and other surfaces so slippery that ice cannot adhere. The slick substance is secreted from a film on the wing’s surface as temperatures drop below freezing and retreats back into the film as temperatures rise.

The researchers presented their work at the 251st National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS). The liquid-secreting materials the researchers have developed, are called self-lubricating organogels or SLUGs. "The SLUGs technology has a host of formulations and applications, including in a gel form that can be encapsulated in a film coating on the surface of a wing or other device,” said Research Director Atsushi Hozumi, PhD.

"We came upon this idea when we observed real slugs in the environment,” Chihiro Urata, PhD, explained. "Slugs live underground in soil when it is daytime and crawl out at night. But we never see slugs covered in dirt. They secrete a liquid mucus on their skin, which repels dirt and the dirt slides off. From this, we started focusing on the phenomenon called syneresis, the expulsion of liquid from a gel.”

The gel and the liquid-repellent substance are held in a matrix of silicone resin. The mix is cured and applied to a surface as a nearly transparent and solid film coating, Urata explains.

Both Urata and Hozumi are at the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science & Technology (Japan).