Colloids and Surfaces A: Physicochemical and Engineering Aspects
UV-durable superhydrophobic textiles with UV-shielding properties by introduction of ZnO/SiO2 core/shell nanorods on PET fibers and hydrophobization
Introduction
Superhydrophobic textiles with a contact angle of above 150° have got great interest in recent years for its potential applications [1], [2], [3], [4]. Superhydrophobic surfaces were mostly fabricated by mimicking the lotus leaf in nature through roughening of substrate followed by hydrophobization [5], [6]. These functions can be added to textiles via fiber modification without a detrimental influence on the mechanical properties of textiles. Poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) textile is widely used for outdoor protection due to its excellent physical property. As markets in outdoor textiles have been expanded, the needs for multifunctional textiles have continuously increased, in which superhydrophobic textiles with UV-shielding property are appreciated very much [2], [7], [8]. Generally speaking, there are mainly two approaches to prepare superhydrophobic surfaces: one is to build rough surface on hydrophobic materials, the other is to construct rough surfaces followed by hydrophobization. Many superhydrophobic surfaces have been successfully obtained [9], [10], in which nanomaterials are usually used to construct suitable roughness, such as ZnO, TiO2, SiO2, etc. [6], [8], [11], [12]. ZnO is a good candidate material due to its easily controlled morphology and excellent UV-shielding property [13], [14], [15].
Textiles with excellent UV-shielding properties have been fabricated by growth of ZnO nanostructures onto fibers [2], [12], [16], [17], [18]. However, photodegradation of organic supports or coverings caused by ZnO and photoinduced superhydrophilicity of ZnO material under light must be seriously considered [1], [3], [19] in fabrication of superhydrophobic textiles with UV-shielding property using ZnO based materials. Until now, most of the reported works grew ZnO nanostructures onto cotton fabrics [2], [12], [16], [18], and only a few work took into consideration the side effects of ZnO under light [2].
In this work, ZnO nanostructures were grown covering around PET fibers to obtain stable superhydrophobic textiles with UV-shielding property after coating of SiO2 followed by hydrophobization, which coincides with the method reported by Wang [2] on superhydrophobic cotton textiles with UV-blocking property. Differently, PET fibers, instead of cotton, were pretreated by NaOH to improve the affinity for ZnO in order to obtain full coating of ZnO seeds and then uniform covering of ZnO rods on fibers, because PET fibers are usually smooth and inert, which disfavors seeding of ZnO. The schematic illustration of these processes was shown in Fig. 1. This method might expand the research on utilization of the excellence of PET fiber, which is superior to cotton fiber for outdoor multifunctional textiles.
Section snippets
Materials
Zinc nitrate hexahydrate (Zn(NO3)2·6H2O, 99% purity) and hexamethylene tetramine (C6H12N4, 99.5%) were purchased from Tianjin Dengfeng Chemical Reagent Co. Ltd. Zinc acetate dehydrate (Zn(CH3COO)2·2H2O, 99% purity) were purchased from Tianjin Yaohua Chemical Reagent Co. Ltd. Poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride) (PDDA, Mw < 200,000) and poly(sodium 4-styrenesulfonate) (PSS, Mw = 70,000) were purchased from Shanghai Herochem Products Co., Ltd. Hexadecyltrimethoxysilane (HDTMS) was purchased from
Morphology and structure of samples
The morphologies of the modified PET textiles were shown in Fig. 2. It was found that disk-like platelets and pencil-like rods with different diameters of ZnO were formed depending on the zinc salt concentration. When the zinc salt concentration was between 0.25 M and 0.15 M, disk-like ZnO platelets were formed, as shown in Fig. 2(a) and (b). When the zinc salt concentration was 0.25 M, the average diameter and thickness of the disk-like ZnO are about 10 μm and 1 μm, respectively. While when the
Conclusions
In summery, ZnO nanostructures with different topographies were grown on the PET textiles by a hydrothermal method at a low temperature of 93 °C. It is found that when the concentrations of Zn(NO3)2 and C6H12N4 ranged from 0.025 M to 0.10 M, pencil-like ZnO nanorod crystallites can be formed uniformly around the fibers, imparting excellent UV-shielding property to the textiles. And the ZnO nanorod covering on the fibers roughened dramatically the textile surfaces, favouring the formation of
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University (NCET-12-1042), Major State Basic Research Development Program of China (973 Program) (Grant No. 2011CB612309), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51073091), the Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education of China (Grant No. 20116125110002), the Key Project of Chinese Ministry of Education (Grant No. 212171), Program for Transformation of Important Scientific and Technological
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