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Research Article

Recycling plastic waste into multifunctional superhydrophobic textiles

Qinglang Ma1,5, Zhiying Wu2, Vlad Andrei Neacșu2, Sai Zhao6, Yu Chai6, Hua Zhang2,3,4 ( )
Frontiers Science Center for High Energy Material, Beijing Key Laboratory of Photoelectronic/Electrophotonic Conversion Materials, Key Laboratory of Cluster Science, Ministry of Education, Advanced Research Institute of Multidisciplinary Science, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing 100081, China
Department of Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong 999077, China
Hong Kong Branch of National Precious Metals Material Engineering Research Center (NPMM), City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong 999077, China
Shenzhen Research Institute, City University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen 518057, China
Center for Programmable Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 50 Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 639798, Singapore
Department of Physics, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong 999077, China
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Graphical Abstract

A multifunctional superhydrophobic textile is developed by recycling a common waste plastic, i.e., polystyrene, via a facial dip-coating method with SiO2 nanospheres as co-coating material, which can selectively separate oil/water mixtures, withstand various harsh conditions, and exhibit self-cleaning property. This work offers an effective strategy to simultaneously mitigate the plastic pollution and prepare multifunctional superhydrophobic materials at low cost.

Abstract

The plastic pollution has become one of the top environmental concerns. Substantial effort has been devoted into recycling waste plastic materials in a facile and economical way. In this work, we have successfully recycled a common type of plastic waste, i.e., polystyrene (PS), into value-added functional materials through a cost-effective and facile dip-coating method. The resulted mixture of waste PS and SiO2, referred to as PS/SiO2, coated textile material is superhydrophobic and superoleophilic, showing an excellent resistance towards corrosive solutions (acid, alkaline, and saline), high temperature treatment, and mechanical abrasion. As a proof-of-concept application, the PS/SiO2-coated textile is used to selectively separate oil/water mixtures through either absorption or filtration method. It also exhibits a surface self-cleaning property, which may be used as fabrics for dust-preventing cloths. Our work offers a new strategy to treat the waste for preparation of novel low-cost superhydrophobic materials for various applications.

Keywords

waste recyclingsuperhydrophobicoil water separationself-cleaning

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Nano Research
Volume 15 Issue 11,
November 2022
Pages 9921-9925
DOI: 10.1007/s12274-022-4249-y
Cite this article:
Ma Q, Wu Z, Neacșu VA, et al. Recycling plastic waste into multifunctional superhydrophobic textiles. Nano Research, 2022, 15(11): 9921-9925. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-022-4249-y
Topics:
Superhydrophobicity
Part of a topical collection:
Eighth Nano Research Award

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Received: 28 December 2021
Revised: 10 February 2022
Accepted: 17 February 2022
Published: 19 March 2022
© Tsinghua University Press 2022
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