Who would have thought that the age old tradition of hacking at a windshield with a piece of plastic would soon be on its way out? Dartmouth professor Victor Petrenko has designed PETD—pulse electrothermal de-icing. This thin film can completely clear a windshield in a second. It is already being use in Sweden to cover the Uddevalla Bridge to prevent icing over. PETD can also work in reverse by creating better bonds between ice an surfaces, great for snowboarders or skiers.
It works by breaking the first two bonds between the ice and whatever surface it is on. An electric charge is used to heat up a micron layer of the surface breaking the bond, then the resulting water acts as a lubricant and all of the ice slides away.
A high-tech way to defrost [News.com]
