title: A facile solvent-manipulated mesh for reversible oil/water separation.
abstract: A controllable oil/water separation mesh has been successfully developed and easily manipulated by immersion in a stearic acid ethanol solution and tetrahydrofuran with a very short period of time. The superhydrophilic and underwater superoleophobic mesh is first obtained via a one-step chemical oxidation and subsequently converts to superhydrophobic after it is immersed in an ethanol solution of stearic acid for 5 min. The surface wettability is regained to superhydrophilic quickly by immersion in tetrahydrofuran for 5 min. More importantly, the reversible superhydrophobic-and-superhydrophilic switching can be repeated multiple times with almost no visible morphology variation. Therefore, this approach provides potential application in controllable oil/water separation and opens up new perspectives in manipulation of various metallic oxide substrates.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Tsinghua University , Beijing, 100084, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Na
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Yingze
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Cao
authors.forename: Xin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.forename: Yuning
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Lin
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Feng
authors.forename: Yen
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wei