Uniform, Anticorrosive, and Antiabrasive Coatings on Metallic Surfaces for Cation–Metal and Cation−π Interactions

Abstract

Metals are widely used from daily life to modern industry. Great efforts have been made to protect the metals with various coatings. However, the well-known conventional electrochemical corrosion induced by cations and the ubiquitous nature of the coffee-ring effect make these processes very difficult. Here, a scheme by two bridges of cations and ethylenediamine (EDA) is proposed to overcome coffee-ring effect and electrochemical corrosion and experimentally achieve uniform, anti-corrosive and anti-abrasive coatings on metallic surfaces. Anti-corrosive capability reaches about 26 times higher than that without cation-controlled coatings at 12 hours in extremely acidic, high-temperature and high-humidity conditions, and still enhances to 2.7 times over a week. Anti-abrasive capability also reaches 2.5 times. Theoretical calculations show that the suspended materials are uniformly adsorbed on the surface mediated by complexed cations through strong cation–metal and cation–π interactions. Notably, the well-known conventional electrochemical corrosion induced by cations is avoided by EDA to control cations solubility in different coating processes. These findings provide a new efficient, cost-effective, facile, and scalable method to fabricate protective coatings on metallic materials and a methodology to study metallic nanostructures in solutions, benefitting practical applications including coatings, printing, dyeing, electrochemical protection and biosensors.