Facile preparation of raspberry-like superhydrophobic polystyrene particles via seeded dispersion polymerization

A simple and facile approach was developed to fabricate raspberry-like or snowman-like particles via seeded dispersion polymerization by just changing the ratio of second monomer styrene (St) to seeds in which poly(styrene-co-hydrolyzed-methacryloxypropyltrimethoxysilane) [P(St-co-MPS)] latex was used as seeds with hydrolyzed-MPS as a cross-linking agent. The morphologies of final products were confirmed by field-emission scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy. Interestingly, the seed part of snowman-like particles showed raspberry-like with adsorbing quantities of PS particles while the other part smooth. The formation mechanism of the raspberry-like particles was also discussed. The superhydrophobic surface with both the static contact angle of 158° and high adhesion to water could be achieved by the hydrophobization of the particulate film with octadecyltrimethoxysilane that was formed from the raspberry-like particles decorated by a thin layer of silica nanoparticles. Further, through encapsulating Ag nanoparticles within the surface, the obtained raspberry-like PS/Ag/SiO2 nanocomposite particles exhibited excellent antibacterial property simultaneously.