KIT capillary ratchets assemble ultrafine fiber bundles

The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) has announced research showing that water-surface flows can drive controlled single-direction rotation of a floating object, enabling microassembly of ultrafine fibers into structured bundles.

• Researchers from KIT and SINANO demonstrated a capillary ratchet mechanism in which water-surface flows rotate a floating object without chemistry, electricity, or magnetic fields.
• The method assembled silk fibers with diameters of 10 to 20 micrometers into multilayered twisted bundles for potential use in low-loss transmission cables in data centers, surgical sutures, and artificial muscles; the work was published in Science Advances and funded by DFG, ERC, and SINANO.