Bio-Inspired Surfaces and Applications

Through millions of years' natural selection, sharkskin has developed into a kind of drag-reducing surface. This book shows how to investigate, model, fabricate and apply sharkskin's unique surface properties, creating a flexible platform for surface and materials engineers and scientists to readily adopt or adapt for their own bio-inspired materials.Rather than inundate the reader with too many examples of materials inspired by nature, sharkskin has been chosen as the center-piece to illustrate accurate 3D digital modeling of surfaces, complete numerical simulation of micro flow field, different fabrication methods, and application to natural gas pipelining. This is a must-read for any researcher or engineer involved in bio-inspired surfaces and materials studies.