Hydrophobic Modification of Biopolymer Aerogels by Cold Plasma Coating

The aim of this work was to evaluate the potential of cold plasma polymerization as a simple, fast and versatile technique for deposition of protective hydrophobic and oleophobic polymer layers on hydrophilic biopolymer aerogels. Polymerization of different fluorinated monomers (octafluorocyclobutane C₄F₈ and perfluoro-acrylates PFAC-6 and PFAC-8) on aerogel monoliths derived from alginate, cellulose, whey protein isolate (WPI) and potato protein isolate (PPI) resulted in fast and significant surface hydrophobization after short process times of 5 min and led to superhydrophobic surfaces with static water contact angles up to 154° after application of poly-C₄F₈ coatings. Simultaneous introduction of hydro- and oleophobicity was possible by deposition of perfluoro-acrylates. While the porous structure of aerogels stayed intact during the process, polymerization inside the aerogels pores led to the generation of new porous moieties and resulted therefore in significant increase in the specific surface area. The magnitude of the effect depended on the individual process settings and on the overall porosity of the substrates. A maximization of specific surface area increase (+179 m²/g) was obtained by applying a pulsed wave mode in the C₄F₈-coating of alginate aerogels.