J Mater Sci Technol ›› 2008, Vol. 24 ›› Issue (05): 693-699.

• Research Articles • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Morphologies and Superhydrophobicity of Hybrid Film Surfaces Based on Silica and Fluoropolymer

Ailan QU, Xiufang WEN, Pihui PI, Jiang CHENG, Zhuoru YANG   

  1. School of Chemical and Energy Engineering, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510640, China
  • Received:2007-04-02 Revised:2007-09-17 Online:2008-09-28 Published:2009-10-10
  • Contact: Xiufang WEN

Abstract: Fluoropolymer and different kinds of silica particles were used for controlling surface chemistry and morphology, respectively. A superhydrophobic surface originated from strawberry-like or quincunx-shaped composite silica particles was obtained. The dual size particles are obtained by utilizing the graft of different modified silica particles with epoxy functional group and amine functional group. This makes the surface of film form a composite interface to have irregular binary structure which plays an essential role in trapping air between the substrate surface and the liquid droplets to be necessary for high contact angle and low contact angle hysteresis. The maximum contact angle for water on the hybrid film is about 174±2° and the contact angle hysteresis is less than 2°. The surface morphologies, roughness and the wettability on the surface of films containing different structural silica particles were compared. It was shown that the hierarchical irregularly structure with a low roughness factor and high air-trapped ratio is indispensable for superhydrophobic surface. Although this structural surfaces based on composite silica particles play a vital role in governing the surface wettability, it is necessary to combine with a low surface energy to make the surface superhydrophobic.

Key words: Superhydrophobicity, Hierarchical irregularly structure, Silica particles, Fluoropolymer