Stimuli-responsive surfaces that can regulate and control cell adhesion have attracted much attention for their great potential in diverse biomedical applications. Unlike for pH- and temperature-responsive surfaces, the process of photoswitching requires no additional input of chemicals or thermal energy. In this work, two different photoresponsive azobenzene films are synthesized by chemisorption and electrostatic layer-by-layer (LbL) assembly techniques. The LbL film exhibits a relatively loose packing of azobenzene chromophores compared with the chemisorbed film. The changes in trans/cis isomer ratio of the azobenzene moiety and the corresponding wettability of the LbL films are larger than those of the chemisorbed films under UV light irradiation. The tendency for cell adhesion on the LbL films decreases markedly after UV light irradiation, whereas adhesion on the chemisorbed films decreases only slightly, because the azobenzene chromophores stay densely packed. Interestingly, the tendency for cell adhesion can be considerably increased on rough substrates, the roughness being introduced by use of photolithography and inductively coupled plasma deep etching techniques. For the chemisorbed films on rough substrates, the amount of cells that adhere also changes slightly after UV light irradiation, whereas, the amount of cells that adhere to LbL films on rough substrates decreases significantly.

Surfaces with anisotropic wettability, widely found in nature, have inspired the development of one-dimensional water control on surfaces relying on the well-arranged surface features. Controlling the wetting behavior of organic liquids, especially the motion of oil fluid on surfaces, is of great importance for a broad range of applications including oil transportation, oil-repellent coatings, and water/oil separation. However, anisotropic oil-wetting surfaces remain unexplored. Here, the unique skin of a filefish Navodon septentrionalis shows anisotropic oleophobicity under water. On the rough skin of N. septentrionalis, oil droplets tend to roll off in a head-to-tail direction, but pin in the opposite direction. This pronounced wetting anisotropy results from the oriented hook-like spines arrayed on the fish skin. It inspires further exploration of the artificial anisotropic underwater oleophobic surfaces: By mimicking the oriented hook-like microstructure on a polydimethylsiloxane layer via soft lithography and subsequent oxygen-plasma treatment to make the PDMS hydrophilic, artificial fish skin is fabricated which has similar anisotropic underwater oleophobicity. Drawn from the processing of artificial fish skin, a simple principle is proposed to achieve anisotropic underwater oleophobicity by adjusting the hydrophilicity of surface composition and the anisotropic microtextures. This principle can guide the simple mass manufacturing of various inexpensive high surface-energy materials, and the principle is demonstrated on commercial cloth corduroy. This study will profit broad applications involving low-energy, low-expense oil transportation, underwater oil collection, and oil-repellant coatings on ship hulls and oil pipelines.

Fractal structures in nature offer a unique “fractal contact mode” that guarantees the efficient working of an organism with an optimized style. Fractal nanostructured biointerfaces have shown great potential for the ultrasensitive detection of disease-relevant biomarkers from small biomolecules on the nanoscale to cancer cells on the microscale. This review will present the advantages of fractal nanostructures, the basic concept of designing fractal nanostructured biointerfaces, and their biomedical applications for the ultrasensitive detection of various disease-relevant biomarkers, such microRNA, cancer antigen 125, and breast cancer cells, from unpurified cell lysates and the blood of patients.

The control of cell gradients is critical for understanding many biological systems and realizing the unique functionality of biomimetic implants. Herein, we report a nanotopographic gradient strategy that can rapidly generate cell gradients on a nanodendritic silica substrate without any chemical modification. We can achieve controllable cell gradients within only half an hour of cell incubation solely induced by the topographic effect of the gradient nanodendrites. We also demonstrate that cell gradients can be modulated by the combination of nanotopographic and chemical gradients. The results reveal that the enhanced topographic interactions between the nanodentritic structure and nanoscaled filopodia of the cells mainly contribute to the generation of cell gradients.

The control of cell gradients is critical for understanding many biological systems and realizing the unique functionality of biomimetic implants. Herein, we report a nanotopographic gradient strategy that can rapidly generate cell gradients on a nanodendritic silica substrate without any chemical modification. We can achieve controllable cell gradients within only half an hour of cell incubation solely induced by the topographic effect of the gradient nanodendrites. We also demonstrate that cell gradients can be modulated by the combination of nanotopographic and chemical gradients. The results reveal that the enhanced topographic interactions between the nanodentritic structure and nanoscaled filopodia of the cells mainly contribute to the generation of cell gradients.