Structured thermal armour (STA) inhibiting the Leidenfrost effect.

Effective thermal management of high-temperature systems, including rapid cooling and accurate temperature control, has been a necessity in many industrial applications, such as electronics, spacecraft, and nuclear power plants. The well-established water spraying and soaking are among the most commonly used strategies for thermal cooling. Direct contact of water with a hot surface releases the latent energy by the liquid-vapour phase change, presenting a remarkable cooling strategy. However, when the surface temperature exceeds a certain threshold, a stable vapour film is sandwiched between the solid and the liquid due to rapid water evaporation, by which droplets hover over the surface rather than make physical contact with it. This levitation of droplets on hot solids, named after Johann Gottlob Leidenfrost, is known as the Leidenfrost effect. Recently, Jiang et al. reported a multitextured design of structured thermal armour, capable of inhibiting this effect at temperatures up to 1,150 °C.