Accelerating the healing of superhydrophobicity through photothermogenesis

Abstract

We describe a novel approach to efficiently achieve self-healing superhydrophobicity on textiles by spontaneous deposition of polydopamine (PDA) encapsulated octadecylamine (ODA) and Fe₃O₄ nanoparticles. The healing of superhydrophobicity was accelerated by the photothermogenesis effect of Fe₃O₄ nanoparticles under near-infrared (NIR) light within 40 seconds (s). The coated fabric is also robust and durable against washing and mechanical abrasion without apparently changing the superhydrophobicity. In addition, NIR light can be used to realize controllable wettability gradients and patterns on this kind of textile.