An aircraft de-icing method in prototype delays icing by up to 10 times and uses 2-8 times less antifreeze than current de-icing procedures. The innovation is based on the mechanics of the Panamanian poison dart frog's gland secretions to its skin. Using this insight from biology, a plane's surface releases antifreeze only when needed. The technlological innovation was reported in Popular Science.

Konrad Rykaczewski, an assistant professor of engineering at Arizona State University, learned that poison dart frogs have various glands in their skin. Some glands always secrete lubricant, while others secrete only when provoked.

“That was exactly what I wanted from an anti-icing surface," says Rykaczewski. To create the coating for such a surface, Rykaczewski's team took a porous superhydrophobic layer and added a porous superhydrophilic layer underneath. The bottom layer rapidly wicks-in and stores antifreeze, while the top one prevents antifreeze from leaking into the environment.

Freezing rain bounces off the top superhydrophobic layer as it would on a conventional superhydrophobic surface. In humid conditions however, condensation covers normal superhydrophobic surface in frost, which attracts more icing. Rykaczewski's coating may help solve the frosting problem: When ice and water form on top, the antifreeze stored in the superhydrophilic layer below is drawn to the surface where it melts ice into slush.

The coating “shouldn't be any more expensive than what's being used now," says Rykaczewski. It will also help preserve the concrete runways that currently suffer damage when commercial planes are jet-sprayed with solution. The focus now is to optimize the coating's design, improve its performance and make it so that it can applied like paint.