L16 WATER-REPEL
Water & dirt repellency is an increasingly important subject for medical, industrial and consumer products.
Typical examples to explain hydrophobic (“fear of water”) behaviour are lotus flowers (“lotus effect”) and many other leaves. Hydrophobicity can be reached by changing the chemical structure of materials, with or without additives. Today, there are various approaches to reach this goal, either by right polymer selection (i.e. PP – polypropylene), special nano coatings, chemicals or bionic nano particles in polymers.
In example, Scientists at ETH Zurich have developed a novel polymer for coating materials, in order to prevent biofilms from forming on their surfaces, where also microfabricated pillar-to-hole gradient is used to explore the influence of morphology on wetting, or silver nanoparticles are fabricated combining a silver film on a silicon substrate.
Near-atomically-flat titanium patterns (islands) rendered hydrophobic. Other research includes 3D nanopattering of materials. MIT created hydrophobic materials that could even revolutionize fossil fuel and nuclear power plants. Also superhydrophobic nano structured surfaces cause water to bounce like a ball (prof. Julie Crockett, Brigham Young University, https://phys.org/news/2014-05-super-waterproof-surfaces-ball.html).
L16 WATER REPELLENT functional technology is designed for use with polymers. It enables the material surface to repel water or other liquids at room temperature. This additive also eliminates the need for secondary coating or wetting processes to achieve equivalent performance, so no solvents or wetting agents are needed.
You May Also Like
L15 Graphene
LITRAX L15 GRAPHENE has been designed a series of masterbatches for multiple functional purposes. Graphene is an allotrope of carbon consisting of a single layer of atoms arranged in a two-dimensional honeycomb lattice.
L99 CUSTOMIZED
Thoughts become things. Tell us your wildest dream of a functional material, polymer, yarn or surface — and let us help you do it! We assist you during the entire development process from scratch…
LX-DFENS
LX-DFENS is a potent defense against dangerous viruses. LX-DFENS-A protects effectively against human coronavirus ( 99.99% reduction of virus activity), against COVID-19 ( 97.3% with only 3% MB dosage) and similar viruses dangerous to humans.