Capillarity cascade in crystalline micro-architectures for voxelated additive manufacturing

Abstract

Stepwise cascade behavior marks numerous captivating phenomena. In a pre-filled crystalline micro-architecture, periodic polygon droplets, which adopt unit cells’ shapes, dewet upon liquid depletion. Here, we show that, regardless of cells’ spatial arrangement, those polygon droplets implode in a sequence ranked by lattice types, forming an intercellular dewetting order that is then termed the capillarity cascade. Such behavior is derived from unique imploding pressures associated with those lattices whose magnitudes originate from temporal adhesive and cohesive competition in the three-dimensional enclosed geometry. Using crystalline lattice engineering, liquid patterns can be well shaped through the capillarity cascade, which streamlines voxelated multi-material construction that features simplicity and high resolution. The capillarity cascade in a spatially periodic layout merits untold potential spanning an array of fields, including materials assembly, energy storage, and tissue modeling. Graphical abstract: [Figure not available: see fulltext.]