A durable Watasenia Scintillans-like luminescent hydrophilic coating for synergistic high-efficiency anti-biofouling

Antifouling schematic diagram of the composite hydrophilic luminescent coating and schematic diagram of antifouling principle of luminescent layer. [Display omitted] •A novel composite antifouling coating inspired by Watasenia Scintillans is designed by combining hydrophilic surface and luminescence layer.•The highly hydrophilic transparent layer is prepared by pre-embedded active site and UV initiating zwitterion polymerization.•The luminescence layer shows a significant interference on biorhythm of fouling organisms, and achieves anti-fouling effectively cooperated with the hydrophilic coating. Marine bio-fouling has been a longstanding problem facing the marine industry, which affects the underwater facilities and causes serious economic losses. It is highly desirable to develop an effective antifouling coating currently. Here a novel antifouling coating inspired by Watasenia Scintillans is reported, which achieves excellent performance by synergism of highly hydrophilic surface and luminescence layer, where pentaerythritol triacrylate embedded in the acrylic resins provides active sites for the graft of poly (sulfobetaine methacrylate) (PSBMA) brush via UV-initiation. The antifouling test results show that the coating can effectively resist the adhesion of non-specific proteins, i.e. the adsorption amount of bovine serum albumin is decreased from 220.83 ng/cm2 of blank control to 40.01 ng/cm2, and the attachment amount of Phaeodyylum tricornutum is decreased to 67n/mm2, which is nearly one-sixth of the blank control (383n/mm2). After compounding fast rechargeable fluorescent particles with PSBMA coating, the adhesion amount of diatoms is further dropped to 4n/mm2, since long-lasting light can effectively interfere with the normal biorhythm of fouling organisms. The long-term underwater field tests results also proved the long-term durability and excellent performance of the hydrophilic luminescent coating in the complex actual aquatic environment. It is believed that the advantageous characteristics of the as-described composite eco-friendly coating and simplicity of the preparation process will be a pioneer for future marine anti-biofouling industry, since various biological fouling at different period underwater can be inhibited effectively.