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Creating a robust superhydrophobic surface on the conventional engineering materials at mass production is of great importance for a self-cleaning, anti-icing, nonwetting surface and low flow resistance in industrial applications. Herein, we report a roll-to-roll strategy to create durable and robust superhydrophobic surfaces with designed micro-/nanoscale hierarchical structures on many conventional engineering materials by combining electrical discharge machining and coating of carbon nanoparticles, followed by oil penetration and drying. The treated surface shows good superhydrophobic properties with a static water contact angle of 170 ± 2° and slide angle of 3 ± 1°. The treated surface also exhibits good resilience and maintains the performance after being tested in various harsh conditions, including water flushing for several days, sand abrasion, scratching with sandpapers, and corrosive solution. Significantly, the superhydrophobic surfaces also show a high efficiency of self-cleaning properties even after oil contamination during applications.

Porous CuO nanosheets were prepared on alumina tubes using a facile hydrothermal method, and their morphology, microstructure, and gas-sensing properties were investigated. The monoclinic CuO nanosheets had an average thickness of 62.5 nm and were embedded with numerous holes with diameters ranging from 5 to 17 nm. The porous CuO nanosheets were used to fabricate gas sensors to detect hydrogen sulfide (H2S) operating at room temperature. The sensor showed a good response sensitivity of 1.25 with respond/recovery times of 234 and 76 s, respectively, when tested with the H2S concentrations as low as 10 ppb. It also showed a remarkably high selectivity to the H2S, but only minor responses to other gases such as SO2, NO, NO2, H2, CO, and C2H5OH. The working principle of the porous CuO nanosheet based sensor to detect the H2S was identified to be the phase transition from semiconducting CuO to a metallic conducting CuS.