Smart Surfaces

Superhydrophobic surfaces, artificially mimicking lotus leaves, have captured the attention of scientists and engineers over the past few decades. Recent trends have shifted from superhydrophobicity to superominipohobicity, or superamphiphobicity. In addition, dynamic rather than static surface wetting/dewetting properties, which can be triggered by various stimuli, including temperature, pH, magnetic/electric fields, solvents, light exposure etc, have been highly sought after for commercial applications. This book will focus on recent topics related to various stimuli-responsive wetting/dewetting surfaces, and give an overview of the knowledge and concepts of how to design and establish these smart artificial surfaces, which can be used for technical developments in a wide variety research fields.

A comprehensive overview of smart and responsive surfaces in biotechnology and their applications A wave of recent advances in cell biology, biophysics, chemistry, and materials science has enabled the development of a new generation of smart biomaterials. Intelligent Surfaces in Biotechnology: Scientific and Engineering Concepts, Enabling Technologies, and Translation to Bio-Oriented Applications provides readers with a comprehensive overview of surface modifications and their applications, including coverage of the physico-chemical properties, characterization methods, smart coating technologies, and demonstration of performance in vitro and in vivo. The first part of the book covers applications in the fields of biosensing and biodiagnostics, while the second part focuses more on coatings for medical devices, drug delivery, and tailored cell-surface interactions. The book explores intelligent surface applications such as tissue engineering, drug targeting and delivery, wound healing and anti-infection strategies, biosensors, nanopatterning, and bioinspired design of novel responsive materials and multifunctional surfaces. Designed to aid scientists and engineers in understanding the rapidly developing field of biofunctional surfaces, Intelligent Surfaces in Biotechnology is an edited volume with each chapter written by a respected expert and featuring examples taken from the most state-of-the-art developments in the discipline. Cover Image: Design concept for a diagnostic microfluidic system based on responsive polymer- and antibody-conjugated nanobeads (see Chapter 2 of this book, Figure 2.5; reproduced by permission from the Royal Society of Chemistry).

INTELLIGENT SURFACES EMPOWERED 6G WIRELESS NETWORK Integrate intelligent surfaces into the wireless networks of the future. The next generation of wireless technology (6G) promises to transform wireless communication and human interconnectivity like never before. Intelligent surface, which adopts significant numbers of small reflective surfaces to reconfigure wireless connections and improve network performance, has recently been recognized as a critical component for enabling future 6G. The next phase of wireless technology demands engineers and researchers are familiar with this technology and are able to cope with the challenges. Intelligent Surfaces Empowered 6G Wireless Network provides a thorough overview of intelligent surface technologies and their applications in wireless networks and 6G. It includes an introduction to the fundamentals of intelligent surfaces, before moving to more advanced content for engineers who understand them and look to apply them in the 6G realm. Its detailed discussion of the challenges and opportunities posed by intelligent surfaces empowered wireless networks makes it the first work of its kind. Intelligent Surfaces Empowered 6G Wireless Network readers will also find: An editorial team including the original pioneers of intelligent surface technology. Detailed coverage of subjects including MIMO, terahertz, NOMA, energy harvesting, physical layer security, computing, sensing, machine learning, and more. Discussion of hardware design, signal processing techniques, and other critical aspects of IRS engineering. Intelligent Surfaces Empowered 6G Wireless Network is a must for students, researchers, and working engineers looking to understand this vital aspect of the coming 6G revolution.

A comprehensive and systematic treatment that focuses on surfaces and interfaces phenomena inhabited in biomimetic superhydrophobic materials, offering new fundamentals and novel insights. As such, this new book covers the natural surfaces, fundamentals, fabrication methods and exciting applications of superhydrophobic materials, with particular attention paid to the smart surfaces that can show switchable and reversible water wettability under external stimuli, such as pH, temperature, light, solvents, and electric fields. It also includes recent theoretical advances of superhydrophobic surfaces with regard to the wetting process, and some promising breakthroughs to promote this theory. As a result, materials scientists, physicists, physical chemists, chemical engineers, and biochemists will benefit greatly from a deeper understanding of this topic.

This book introduces various advanced, smart materials and the strategies for the design and preparation for novel uses from macro to micro or from biological, inorganic, organic to composite materials. Selecting the best material is a challenging task, requiring tradeoffs between material properties and designing functional smart materials. The de

Smart polymers are polymers that respond to different stimuli or changes in the environment. Smart Polymers and their Applications reviews the types, synthesis, properties, and applications of smart polymers. Chapters in part one focus on types of polymers, including temperature-, pH-, photo-, and enzyme-responsive polymers. Shape memory polymers, smart polymer hydrogels, and self-healing polymer systems are also explored. Part two highlights applications of smart polymers, including smart instructive polymer substrates for tissue engineering; smart polymer nanocarriers for drug delivery; the use of smart polymers in medical devices for minimally invasive surgery, diagnosis, and other applications; and smart polymers for bioseparation and other biotechnology applications. Further chapters discuss the use of smart polymers for textile and packaging applications, and for optical data storage. Smart Polymers and their Applications is a technical resource for chemists, chemical engineers, mechanical engineers, and other professionals in the polymer industry; manufacturers in such sectors as medical, automotive, and aerospace engineering; and academic researchers in polymer science. Reviews the different types of smart polymer, discussing their properties, structure, design, and characterization Reviews applications of smart polymers in such areas as biomedical engineering, textiles, and food packaging

The book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 13th EAI International Conference on Communications and Networking, held in October 2018 in Chengdu, China. The 71 papers presented were carefully selected from 114 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on wireless communications and networking, next generation WLAN, big data networks, cloud communications and networking, ad hoc and sensor networks, satellite and space communications and networking, optical communications and networking, information and coding theory, multimedia communications and smart networking, green communications and computing, signal processing for communications, network and information security, machine-to-machine and IoT, communication QoS, reliability and modeling, cognitive radio and networks, smart internet of things modeling, pattern recognition and image signal processing, digital audio and video signal processing, antenna and microwave communications, radar imaging and target recognition, and video coding and image signal processing.

“Green” buildings—buildings that use fewer resources to build and to sustain—are commonly thought to be too expensive to attract builders and buyers. But are they? The answer to this question has enormous consequences, since residential and commercial buildings together account for nearly 50% of American energy consumption—including at least 75% of electricity usage—according to recent government statistics. This eye-opening book reports the results of a large-scale study based on extensive financial and technical analyses of more than 150 green buildings in the U.S. and ten other countries. It provides detailed findings on the costs and financial benefits of building green. According to the study, green buildings cost roughly 2% more to build than conventional buildings—far less than previously assumed—and provide a wide range of financial, health and social benefits. In addition, green buildings reduce energy use by an average of 33%, resulting in significant cost savings. Greening Our Built World also evaluates the cost effectiveness of “green community development” and presents the results of the first-ever survey of green buildings constructed by faith-based organizations. Throughout the book, leading practitioners in green design—including architects, developers, and property owners—share their own experiences in building green. A compelling combination of rock-solid facts and specific examples, this book proves that green design is both cost-effective and earth-friendly.

This book presents novel RIS-Based Smart Radio techniques, targeting at achieving high-quality channel links in cellular communications via design and optimization of the RIS construction. Unlike traditional antenna arrays, three unique characteristics of the RIS will be revealed in this book. First, the built-in programmable configuration of the RIS enables analog beamforming inherently without extra hardware or signal processing. Second, the incident signals can be controlled to partly reflect and partly transmit through the RIS simultaneously, adding more flexibility to signal transmission. Third, the RIS has no digital processing capability to actively send signals nor any radio frequency (RF) components. As such, it is necessary to develop novel channel estimation and communication protocols, design joint digital and RIS-based analog beamforming schemes and perform interference control via mixed reflection and transmission. This book also investigates how to integrate the RIS to legacy communication systems. RIS techniques are further investigated in this book (benefited from its ability to actively shape the propagation environment) to achieve two types of wireless applications, i.e., RF sensing and localization. The influence of the sensing objectives on the wireless signal propagation can be potentially recognized by the receivers, which are then utilized to identify the objectives in RF sensing. Unlike traditional sensing techniques, RIS-aided sensing can actively customize the wireless channels and generate a favorable massive number of independent paths interacting with the sensing objectives. It is desirable to design RIS-based sensing algorithms, and optimize RIS configurations. For the second application, i.e., RIS aided localization, an RIS is deployed between the access point (AP) and users. The AP can then analyze reflected signals from users via different RIS configurations to obtain accurate locations of users. However, this is a challenging task due to the dynamic user topology, as well as the mutual influence between multiple users and the RIS. Therefore, the operations of the RIS, the AP, and multiple users need to be carefully coordinated. A new RIS-based localization protocol for device cooperation and an RIS configuration optimization algorithm are also required. This book targets researchers and graduate-level students focusing on communications and networks. Signal processing engineers, computer and information scientists, applied mathematicians and statisticians, who work in RIS research and development will also find this book useful.

Through natural evolvement in thousands of years, biosurfaces have become highly adaptable to display their biological functions perfectly. Interestingly, they have developed micro-/nanostructures with gradient features to achieve smart wetting controls, such as ultra-hydrophobic water repellency in lotus leaf, directional water collection in wette