Multifunctional and responsive surfaces based on fs laser micro/nano structuring of silicon

The authors report a methodology for the development of multifunctional responsive surfaces via ablating Si wafers with femtosecond laser pulses and subsequently coating them with different types of functional coatings. The initial laser structured surfaces exhibit controlled dual-scale roughness at both the micro- and the nano-scale, which mimics the hierarchical morphology of responsive surfaces found in nature.