Marine fouling and drag cause damage to infrastructure and high emissions in shipping. The Neto group investigates new ways of understanding, controlling, and reducing marine fouling and drag. 

Contributors: Research group

We design ‘liquid-like’ coatings, known as slippery covalently-attached liquid surfaces (SCALS), that are amongst the most slippery coatings to droplets ever prepared, without relying on problematic perfluorinated polymers (PFAS), ‘forever chemicals’ that are usually used for their low adhesion properties. 

Contributors: Research group

Water and organic solvents contain significant concentration of dissolved air which is often ignored when modelling interfaces. A Discovery project of the Australian Research Council is supporting work to investigate the accumulation of dissolved gas at liquid-liquid interfaces, and its potential effect of interfacial flow. 

Contributors: Research group

Maintaining a stable supply of drinking water in Australia is a continual challenge. The Neto group explores harvesting water directly from the atmosphere as a viable alternative, which could provide an energy-effective and localised method of water capture, especially useful in remote communities where the local humidity is high. Part of this research resulted in the incorporation of start-up company Dewpoint Innovations.

Contributors: Research group

The Neto group has worked for almost two decade with leading paint company Dulux Australia to advance paint through the addition of nanostructured additives that improve the stain resistance, robustness, and sustainability of paint.

Contributors: Research group