Condensation is an important technical process in industry. In order to optimize the efficiency of condensation plates, the extent to which different surface structures can increase the efficiency of the condensation process is being investigated.

In a first step, parallel ridge structures were transferred to silicon wafers, whereby the ridge shape was varied in the longitudinal direction and a material-related wetting contrast was also implemented. It was found that by combining hydrophilic and hydrophobic structures, droplets were first sucked into the trenches from the surfaces after an initialization phase and then transported away. This process continued continuously. Due to the small structural width of the bars and trenches (each 30 µm wide), the size of the condensing droplets and thus their thermal resistance could also be kept small. This was evaluated by analyzing images taken in-situ using the Hough circle transform algorithm [1].