Wettability behavior of special microscale ZnO nail-coated mesh films for oil-water separation

The surface free energy and geometrical structure are two important factors to govern the surface wettability. However, the design and simple synthesis of materials with specific surface free energy and geometrical structure, and their elaborate regulations are still a key challenge. Herein, through one-step thermal evaporation method, we successfully synthesized aligned arrays of highly crystallized ZnO with modulated nail structures on the stainless steel meshes for the first time. Owing to the decoration of [0001] oriented nail structures, the wire surface of meshes were indeed enclosed by the ZnO (0002) facets, which had the lowest surface energy in wurtzite structure. Under no any further modifications, just by regulating the nail structure and density as well as the mesh pore sizes, we not only obtained ZnO nail-coated mesh with hydrophobic, oleophilic (oil penetration), and underwater oleophilic properties, but also fabricated one with hydrophilic (water penetration), oleophilic (oil penetration), and underwater superoleophobic properties. Furthermore, interestingly, the separation of oil and water mixture was realized by utilizing two ZnO-nail coated meshes with different wettability. The underlying mechanism was investigated and discussed in the work. Therefore, our study provides interesting insight into the design of novel functional films with desired surface wettability for the separation of oil-water mixture.