Hong Fei, Xie Laiyong, He Chuanxin, Liu Jianhong, Zhang Guangzhao, Wu Chi
The Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at Microscale, Department of Chemical Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230026, China.
J Mater Chem B. 2013 Apr 21;1(15):2048-2055. doi: 10.1039/c3tb00031a. Epub 2013 Feb 28.
We prepared hybrid antifouling coatings with a self-generated topographical microgel surface by mixing small surface-functionalized microgels with a self-peeling resin and a poly-functional cross-linking agent (axiridine). The microgels were prepared by copolymerizing acrylamide (AAm) and methacrylic acid (MAA). The resin is a random terpolymer made of methyl methacrylate (MMA), acrylic acid (AA) and triisopropylsilyl methacrylate (TIPSM). During the coating process, the microgels and terpolymer chains are cross-linked together to form a hard thin film. After it is immersed into sea water, the microgels dispersed and embedded on the film surface are swollen, generating small and soft bumps, and at the same time, the hydrolysis of TIPSM makes the surface layer hydrophilic, forming a thin layer of soft hydrogel. A combination of these two effects leads to a soft and dynamic topographical surface layer with many well-structured microgel bumps. Such a soft and dynamic surface is self-generating; namely, the hydrolysis of TIPSM eventually makes the terpolymer chains on the surface soluble so that a thin layer of them is gradually dissolved and washed away and the inner layer is further exposed to sea water. Here, both the self-peeling and topographically structured surface by small microgel bumps lead to antifouling properties. To test such a novel idea, we prepared a set of coatings with different microgel and TIPSM contents and evaluated their antifouling properties in a real marine environment. We found some optimal composition at which the coatings showed excellent antifouling properties in the field tests. Moreover, adding the microgels reduces the amount of expensive TIPSM required so that the coatings become more cost-effective, which is vitally important for industrial applications.
我们通过将表面功能化的小微凝胶与自剥离树脂和多官能交联剂（氮丙啶）混合，制备了具有自生成拓扑微凝胶表面的混合防污涂层。小微凝胶通过丙烯酰胺（AAm）和甲基丙烯酸（MAA）共聚制备。该树脂是由甲基丙烯酸甲酯（MMA）、丙烯酸（AA）和甲基丙烯酸三异丙基硅酯（TIPSM）制成的无规三元共聚物。在涂层过程中，小微凝胶和三元共聚物链交联在一起形成坚硬的薄膜。将其浸入海水中后，分散并嵌入薄膜表面的小微凝胶会膨胀，产生小而柔软的凸起，同时，TIPSM的水解使表面层具有亲水性，形成一层柔软的水凝胶薄层。这两种效应共同导致形成具有许多结构良好的微凝胶凸起的柔软且动态的拓扑表面层。这样的柔软且动态的表面是自生成的；也就是说，TIPSM的水解最终使表面的三元共聚物链可溶，从而使它们的薄层逐渐溶解并被冲走，内层进一步暴露于海水中。在这里，自剥离和由小微凝胶凸起构成的拓扑结构表面都具有防污性能。为了验证这一新颖的想法，我们制备了一组具有不同微凝胶和TIPSM含量的涂层，并在真实海洋环境中评估了它们的防污性能。我们发现了一些最佳组成，在这些组成下涂层在现场测试中表现出优异的防污性能。此外，添加微凝胶减少了所需昂贵的TIPSM的用量，从而使涂层更具成本效益，这对工业应用至关重要。
