Superhydrophobic copper surface with mechanical, chemical, and UV durability along with corrosion resistance and self-cleaning effect

Abstract

It is the prerequisite of improving the universality, stability, and wear resistance of superhydrophobic materials for the practical applications. A simple and environment-friendly method is developed herein for constructing superhydrophobic copper surface by hydrothermal method. The wettability, surface microstructure, phase structure, and chemical structure of superhydrophobic Cu2S-coated copper surface are examined by contact angle measurement, SEM observation, XRD measurement, FT-IR and EDS analyses. Results show that the superhydrophobic Cu2S-coated copper surface is composed of a large number of Cu2S crystals grafted with long hydrophobic alkyl chains, and which leads to the superhydrophobic copper presenting a rough and hierarchical surface with micro- and nano-scaled binary structure. It is noteworthy that 200 °C of heat treatment has marked influence on the surface microstructure and wettability. Consequently, the mechanical durability of the superhydrophobic copper has been improved greatly upon heat treatment. Just ground on both the hierarchical surface and grafted long hydrophobic alkyl chains as well as heat treatment, the as-prepared superhydrophobic copper surface exhibits not only good mechanical durability and corrosion resistance, but also excellent chemical and UV durability as well as self-cleaning effect. This method provides a novel and simple process to protect the surface of copper. It is believed that such technique may open a new approach to expand the application of copper. A simple and environment-friendly method is developed for constructing superhydrophobic copper surface by hydrothermal method. Ground on both the hierarchical surface and grafted long hydrophobic alkyl chains as well as heat treatment, the as-prepared superhydrophobic surface exhibits not only good mechanical durability and corrosion resistance, but also excellent chemical and UV durability as well as self-cleaning effect.