1. Outline of Research We study the structure and dynamics of interfaces based on fundamental physical laws. Major topic is wetting of soft materials. Wetting phenomena are ubiquitous in nature and technology. Thus, understanding the wetting dynamics lead to the unachieved design of biomimetic materials, wet processing, and functional interfaces. These outcomes are applied for solving energy and environmental issues, which is our final goal. 2. Current Topics Our major topic is to understand “How to prevent unwanted adhesion to surfaces”. Research targets are fingerprint, snow, mist, nucleated ice, fluidic food, polymer melt, biomaterials, and granular materials.1) The outcomes will offer us ideas to design functional non-adhesion surface materials. We are now in the stage of understanding the dynamics of their adhesion processes by integrating high speed camera with custom-build optical set-ups. 2) One of our achievements is a design of super liquid-repellent coatings as shown in Figure. The surface possesses both nano to micro scale hierarchical structure and hydrophobic surface chemistry. Water droplets rest on this surface exhibits water contact angle of ~170°, and they roll off this surface with small tilting of <5° without any adhesions. We expect this textile can be applied for non-fouling clothing industries, which leads to the significant decrease of laundry costs. Recently we are interested in the development of liquid marble and liquid infused surface.

世の中にある材料における課題の多くは、界面現象が密接に関わっています。我々は物事の根幹にある界面現象をマクロな視点（流体力学）からミクロな視点（熱力学）まで解析し、課題解決のための材料開発を行います。最終的には実用化を目指すために材料の適合性や作製プロセスまでこだわり,工業分野から医療・環境エネルギー分野に役立つ機能性表面材料を創出してきました。