Antiwetting Fabric Produced by a Combination of Layer-by-Layer Assembly and Electrophoretic Deposition of Hydrophobic Nanoparticles

This work describes a nanoparticle coating method to produce durable antiwetting polyester fabric. Electrophoretic deposition is used for fast modification of polyester fabric with silica nanoparticles embedded in polymeric networks for high durability coatings. Typically, electrophoretic deposition (EPD) is utilized on electrically conductive substrates due to its dependence on an applied electrical field. EPD on nonconductive materials has been attempted but are limited by weak adhesion, cracks, and other irregularities. To resolve these issues, we coat polyester fabric with thin polymer layers using electrostatic self-assembly (layer-by-layer self-assembly). Next, silica nanoparticles are uniformly dispersed on the polymer layers. Finally, polymerically stabilized silica nanoparticles are deposited by EPD on the fabric, followed by heat treatment. The modified fabric shows high static contact angle and low contact angle hysteresis, while keeping its original color, flexibility, and air permeability. During a skin fiction resistance test, the hydrophobicity of the coating layer was maintained over 500 h. Furthermore, we also show that this approach facilitates patterned regions of wettability by modifying the electric field in EPD.