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ScienceDaily (July 19, 2012) — A new coating with self-repairing surface functionality has been developed.
Researchers at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) have developed a coating with a surface that repairs itself after damage. This new coating has numerous potential applications -- for example mobile phones that will remain clean from fingerprints, cars that never need to be washed, and aircraft that need less frequent repainting.
The results were published in the 17 July edition of the influential scientific journal Advanced Materials.
Functional coatings, for example with highly water-resistant or antibacterial properties, have at their surface nano-sized molecular groups that provide these specific properties. But up to now, these molecular groups are easily and irreversibly damaged by minor contact with their surface (such as by scratching), quickly causing their properties to be lost. This has been a big limitation to the possible applications of these coatings. Researcher Catarina Esteves of the department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry at TU/e and her colleagues have now found a solution to this problem. They have done this by developing surfaces with special 'stalks' carrying the functional chemical groups at their ends, and mixing these through the coating. If the outer surface layer is removed by scratching, the 'stalks' in the underlying layer re-orient to the new surface, thereby restoring the function.
You May Never Need to Clean Your Car Again, Thanks to New Coating Technology
ScienceDaily (July 19, 2012) A new coating with self-repairing surface functionality has been developed.
Researchers at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) have developed a coating with a surface that repairs itself after damage. This new coating has numerous potential applications -- for example mobile phones that will remain clean from fingerprints, cars that never need to be washed, and aircraft that need less frequent repainting.
The results were published in the 17 July edition of the influential scientific journal Advanced Materials.
Functional coatings, for example with highly water-resistant or antibacterial properties, have at their surface nano-sized molecular groups that provide these specific properties. But up to now, these molecular groups are easily and irreversibly damaged by minor contact with their surface (such as by scratching), quickly causing their properties to be lost. This has been a big limitation to the possible applications of these coatings. Researcher Catarina Esteves of the department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry at TU/e and her colleagues have now found a solution to this problem. They have done this by developing surfaces with special 'stalks' carrying the functional chemical groups at their ends, and mixing these through the coating. If the outer surface layer is removed by scratching, the 'stalks' in the underlying layer re-orient to the new surface, thereby restoring the function.
You may never need to clean your car again, thanks to new coating technology
Well, this will allow us to be lazier!
In summary, amine-functional alternating PASMa copolymer films were synthesized via iCVD for the first time. The retention of the pendant amine and anhydride chemical functionalities was confirmed by FTIR and XPS. The amine-rich alternating copolymer extensively self-crosslinks after gentle heating and this dramatically increases the mechanical properties of the copolymer. The annealed nanocoatings display elastic moduli exceeding 20 GPa in nanoindentation experiments, far greater than typical polymers (0.5 ∼ 5 GPa). Additionally, cross-linked films maintain their flexibility, neither cracking nor delaminating with repeated flexing. This achievement represents a significant advance in the fabrication of tough durable functional coatings. Furthermore, the highly crosslinked coating material has oxygen permeability lower than commercially available permeation barrier coatings, making it an attractive material for electronics or food industries.
In summary, we have newly designed superhydrophobic surfaces with photocatalytic self-cleaning properties by applying co-deposition technique of photoactive TiO2 and hydrophobic PTFE. Such a functional coating might be useful for development of photoactive superhydrophobic materials for various applications. The usages of UV light including natural solar light open the way for keeping clean hydrophobic surface without a complicated system, leading to the energy-saving and maintenance-free hydrophobic coatings.
In summary, we developed new self-healing coatings which recover their surface functionality, i.e. hydrophobicity, upon damage. The self-replenishing effect was achieved by tuning the low surface energy groups bulk-miscibility and mobility via the introduction of a polymeric spacer chemically bonded to the polymer network. The surface replenishment occurs for both low and high Tg coatings, either spontaneously or with a temperature trigger, respectively. The surface replenishment occurs by the reorientation of the dangling chains towards the new surfaces created after damage, most likely creating a depletion layer beneath the new surface. The self-repair of surfaces, as described here, constitutes a novel and versatile approach that can be easily employed for self-healing surface functionalities upon damage or wear. For functional materials which depend on their surface chemistry, e.g. easy-to-clean/low-adherence coatings for automotive, aeronautics, electronic devices or solar cells, this approach constitutes a major breakthrough for the prolongation of the materials and devices service life-time.
