Brió Pérez Maria, Wurm Frederik R, de Beer Sissi
Department of Molecules & Materials, MESA+ Institute, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7500 AE Enschede, The Netherlands.
Langmuir. 2024 Apr 9;40(14):7249-7256. doi: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.3c03683. Epub 2024 Mar 31.
Polymer brushes are unique surface coatings that have been of high interest in research for the past decades due to their covalent tethering to surfaces and the broad spectrum of polymers that can be grafted to or grafted from various surfaces. Modification of surfaces with brushes may provide lubricious and/or antifouling properties, and they can also potentially be used in many application fields due to their high responsiveness toward certain stimuli. Generally, polymer brushes are long-lasting coatings, while their end-of-life has to date largely been neglected. Therefore, it is important to consider additional design methodologies to produce circular brushes, which will degrade after a certain period of time such that surfaces can be reused, and the potentially obtained monomers may be used again to synthesize new brushes. In this Perspective, we aim to tackle and understand the challenges to translate the knowledge on degradation and chemical recycling of bulk polymers toward circular polymer brushes. We summarized the recent developments on (bio)degradable polymer brushes and the challenges that are to be tackled toward their potential implementation as circular coatings.
聚合物刷是一种独特的表面涂层，在过去几十年的研究中备受关注，这是因为它们通过共价键连接到表面，并且可以接枝到各种表面或从各种表面接枝的聚合物种类繁多。用刷子对表面进行改性可以提供润滑和/或防污性能，并且由于它们对某些刺激具有高响应性，还可能在许多应用领域中得到应用。一般来说，聚合物刷是持久的涂层，然而到目前为止它们的使用寿命在很大程度上被忽视了。因此，考虑采用额外的设计方法来制备循环刷很重要，这种刷子在一段时间后会降解，以便表面能够重复使用，并且潜在获得的单体可以再次用于合成新的刷子。在这篇展望文章中，我们旨在应对并理解将本体聚合物降解和化学循环利用方面的知识转化为循环聚合物刷所面临的挑战。我们总结了（生物）可降解聚合物刷的最新进展以及在将其作为循环涂层潜在应用方面需要应对的挑战。
