Nanocontainers for Self-Healing Coatings on Mild Steel

Abstract

Mild steel is an important material in construction, automobile, and other engineering applications. Long exposure to a corrosive environment causes damage to the material and makes it less efficient for usage. Various methodologies such as barrier coatings and self-healing coatings are employed to prevent corrosion to occur. To increase the performance of the coatings, modifications are carried out by the addition of corrosion inhibitors into the coating matrix. Direct addition leads to unwanted reactions with the coating matrix and loss of corrosion inhibitor itself. In order to prevent this problem, nanocontainers are used to encapsulate the self-healing agent/corrosion inhibitor. Therefore, recent corrosion prevention methods involve the fabrication of multifunctional coatings using different nanocontainers such as halloysite nanotubes, polymeric microcapsules, layered double hydroxide, etc. loaded with corrosion inhibitors. The release of corrosion inhibitors works on trigger mechanism arising due to change in external stimuli and thus increasing the durability of the coatings.