The manipulation of liquid droplets on a specific surface with reversible wettability is of great importance for various applications from science to industry. Herein, the concept of a smart, flexible photodriven droplet motion (PDM) device with programmable wettability is designed using the 2D material of MXene film. Because of the MXene photothermal property, the Vaseline layer in the device is in transition between solid and liquid states under the heat transformation due to light illumination, thus attractively producing a reversible wettability for liquid motion with respect to sliding and pinning. Multifarious pathways for liquid motion could be designed through the flexibility of light illumination, which is a revolutionary enhancement in diverse liquid motion to form the desired pathways. In addition, we demonstrated liquid motion under illumination of the back face, which has a profound influence on applications, such as microfluidic systems, microengines, and liquid manipulation.
Keywords: MXene; Ti3C2; light illumination; liquid motion; wettability.