Water and Ice Adhesion to Solid Surfaces: Common and Specific, the Impact of Temperature and Surface Wettability

Abstract

Ice adhesion plays a crucial role in the performance of materials under outdoor conditions, where the mitigation of snow and ice accumulation or spontaneous shedding of solid water precipitations are highly desirable. In this brief review we compare the adhesion of water and ice to different surfaces and consider the mechanisms of ice adhesion to solids basing on the surface forces analysis. The role of a premelted or quasi-liquid layer (QLL) in the ice adhesion is discussed with the emphasis on superhydrophobic surfaces, and the temperature dependence of ice adhesion strength is considered with an account of QLL. We also very briefly mention some recent methods for the measurement of ice adhesion strength to the icephobic engineering materials outlining the problems which remain to be experimentally solved.