title: Nature-Inspired Strategy toward Superhydrophobic Fabrics for Versatile Oil/Water Separation.
abstract: Phytic acid, which is a naturally occurring component that is widely found in many plants, can strongly bond toxic mineral elements in the human body, because of its six phosphate groups. Some of the metal ions present the property of bonding with phytic acid to form insoluble coordination complexes aggregations, even at room temperature. Herein, a superhydrophobic cotton fabric was prepared using a novel and facile nature-inspired strategy that introduced phytic acid metal complex aggregations to generate rough hierarchical structures on a fabric surface, followed by PDMS modification. This superhydrophobic surface can be constructed not only on cotton fabric, but also on filter paper, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) fabric, and sponge. AgI, FeIII, CeIII, ZrIV, and SnIVare very commendatory ions in our study. Taking phytic acid-FeIII-based superhydrophobic fabric as an example, it showed excellent resistance to ultraviolet (UV) irradiation, high temperature, and organic solvent immersion, and it has good resistance to mechanical wear and abrasion. The superhydrophobic/superoleophilic fabric was successfully used to separate oil/water mixtures with separation efficiencies as high as 99.5%. We envision that these superantiwetting fabrics, modified with phytic acid-metal complexes and PDMS, are environmentally friendly, low cost, sustainable, and easy to scale up, and thereby exhibit great potentials in practical applications.
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, South China University of Technology , Guangzhou 510640, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Cailong
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, South China University of Technology , Guangzhou 510640, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Zhaodan
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory for Green Chemical Process of Ministry of Education, School of Chemical Engineering and Pharmacy, Wuhan Institute of Technology , Wuhan 430205, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Hao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, South China University of Technology , Guangzhou 510640, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Kun
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hou
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, South China University of Technology , Guangzhou 510640, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Xinjuan
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zeng
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, South China University of Technology , Guangzhou 510640, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yanfen
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, South China University of Technology , Guangzhou 510640, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Jiang
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9947-6193
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Cheng
keywords: PDMS; fabrics; oil/water separation; phytic acid metal complexes; superhydrophobic