  Wetting is often perceived as an intrinsic surface property of materials, but
determining its evolution is complicated by its complex dependence on roughness
across the scales. The Wenzel state, where liquids have intimate contact with
the rough substrate, and the Cassie-Baxter state, where liquids sit onto air
pockets formed between asperities, are only two states among the plethora of
wetting behaviors. Furthermore, transitions from the Cassie-Baxter to the
Wenzel state dictate completely different surface performance, such as
anti-contamination, anti-icing, drag reduction etc.; however, little is known
about how transition occurs during time between the several wetting modes. In
this paper, we show that wetting dynamics can be accurately quantified and
tracked using solid-liquid triboelectrification. Theoretical underpinning
reveals how surface micro-/nano-geometries regulate stability/infiltration,
also demonstrating the generality of our theoretical approach in understanding
wetting transitions.

Soft Condensed Matter;Materials Science;Applied Physics;Chemical Physics