Cocos nucifera-mediated electrochemical synthesis and coating of CuO/ZnO nanostructures on Fe ship strips for marine application

Abstract

ABSTRACT Copper oxide and zinc oxide nanoparticles (Nanostructures) were synthesized using a greener electrochemical approach using Cocos nucifera (Coir) extract and deposited on Fe ship strip (FSS). These corrosion inhibitor films were characterized by XRD, SEM, BET, Raman Spectroscopy, FTIR spectroscopy, and TGA analysis. An electrochemical corrosion test was performed for the coated samples with 3.5% NaCl as electrolyte and compared with uncoated samples. The corrosion rate was tested using the Tafel slope and the interpolation between the log of current and voltage proves that the corrosion rate in the CuO-coated sample was lower than that of the ZnO-coated sample which can be attributed to the porosity of the ZnO film showing 0.8–0.95 P/P0 as observed for 6 cm2 as inferred from BET analysis. The Nyquist plot suggests the corrosion inhibition rate of the CuO-coated film in 3.5% NaCl is improved by a factor of 3 compared to the uncoated sample (0.9 mA/year for FSS where for the CuO-coated samples 0.3 mA/year). The result of the antifouling behavior of CuO/ZnO coatings using the BIOVIA simulation tool showed the repulsion of homology-modeled protein Aacp20k, an attachment protein found in Amphibalanus Amphitrite which is a most prominent foul species.