Engineering Commons^™

Progress Toward Durable Icephobic Materials, Matthew J. Coady

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Ice accumulation is a major engineering challenge in many fields including aerospace, power generation, transportation, and infrastructure. A variety of solutions are being researched to address this challenge. Perhaps the most promising method of combating ice accumulation is by applying coatings with low values of interfacial ice adhesion strength, τ_ice. Icephobic materials are those with ice adhesion below 100 kPa, and it has been shown that passive delamination can occur on surfaces with τ_ice below 20 kPa. While various low adhesion surfaces have been prepared, durability concerns pervade applications where surfaces experience repeated icing or freeze-thaw cycles, …