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Acid and basic functionalities of nitrogen and carbon dioxide plasma‐treated polystyrene
Author(s) -
Wang MengJiy,
Chang YouIm,
PoncinEpaillard F.
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
surface and interface analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.52
H-Index - 90
eISSN - 1096-9918
pISSN - 0142-2421
DOI - 10.1002/sia.2029
Subject(s) - polystyrene , surface modification , adhesion , chemistry , nitrogen , carbon dioxide , plasma , polymer , monolayer , degradation (telecommunications) , carbon fibers , polymer chemistry , chemical engineering , organic chemistry , materials science , composite material , composite number , biochemistry , telecommunications , physics , quantum mechanics , computer science , engineering
The choice of plasma gas can determine the interaction between material and plasma and therefore the applications of the treated materials. Nitrogen plasma can integrate functional groups such as primary amines and carbon dioxide plasma can incorporate carboxylic groups on the surface of polymers. For specific adhesion such as bio‐adhesion, polar groups must be attached to the surface to enhance bio‐film formation but the acidic or basic character also controls the adhesion mechanism. Nitrogen and carbon dioxide plasmas are chosen to treat the surface of polystyrene and to show the effects of different functionalizations, i.e. attachment of acid or basic groups and degradation are compared in the present work. Nitrogen‐containing plasma induces mainly weak degradation at a rate of ∼0.13 µg cm −2 s −1 . The roughness of the treated surface remains mostly unchanged. Functionalization leads to amino group attachment at a concentration of 1.2 sites nm −2 . We found that carbon dioxide plasma treatment shows more drastic degradation with a rate three times higher than that of nitrogen plasma and can create more functional groups (4.5 sites nm −2 ) at mild plasma treatment. However, the roughness of the surface is altered. In both cases the aromatic groups are degraded through the plasma treatment (again this is more evident with the CO 2 plasma) and the induced functionalization was shown to be quick (the upper monolayer of polystyrene film can be functionalized rapidly). Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.