SUPERHYDROPHOBIC SURFACES AND NANOTECHNOLOGY: A BRIEF REVIEW

Recently, the Lotus leaf-inspired superhydrophobic coating has been used in various industrial applications. Amongthem, the use of superhydrophobic materials for potential application prospects such as oil-water separation has gainedgrowing interest. However, a simple and low-cost strategy for the fabrication of durable superhydrophobic materialsremains a major challenge. The separation of the oil-water mixture is one of the most important applications ofsuperhydrophobic coating. Herein, the superhydrophobic coated stainless steel mesh can be separated easily oil from theoil-water mixture. The candle soot has the advantages of cost-effectiveness and production scalability over other carbons(i.e. graphene, carbon nano-tubes, etc.) in the synthesis. The superhydrophobic coated mesh can be separated easily oilfrom the oil-water mixture. The present work describes the facile fabrication method of preparation of superhydrophobicstainless steel mesh. The layer of candle soot particles is deposited on the mesh by holding in the middle part of a candleflame and thereafter wax is deposited using the dip-coating method to form the candle soot-wax composite coating. Thewater contact angle was 155° and the oil contact angle of nearly 0° reveals the formation of superhydrophobic stainlesssteel mesh that efficiently separates the oil-water mixture. So, this superhydrophobic mesh can be applicable to use inindustries for oil-water separation.