SBIR Phase I: Smart, sustainable and self-healing anticorrosive pigment additive

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This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project will result in the development of smart, self-healing nanocapsules as anticorrosive pigment additive for commercialization of sustainable, economical and metal free acrylic, epoxy or polyurethane based anticorrosive coatings. The nanocapsule additive based anticorrosive coating will meet and exceed the performance of solvent and heavy metals based coatings and disrupt the current technology paradigms by delivering a sustainable and efficient anticorrosive coating technology into the market. The cost to fix or replace corroded structures in the US alone is a staggering $500 Billions/year that is compounded by the toxic environmental impact on account of the use of heavy metals such as, chromium, zinc and lead as anticorrosion pigments. This project will directly address these two important unmet industry needs. For example, the technology will replace heavy metals and deliver corrosion protection exactly when and where it is needed. This will increase the life-time of the coatings, decrease maintenance costs, and reduce the energy and labor costs. This novel technology is simple, scalable, and will find application across multiple industry sectors such as construction, oil & gas, architecture, defense, aerospace etc. The intellectual merit of this project is the development of smart, self-healing, polymer based nanocapsules as pigment additives in anticorrosive coatings. Corrosion is an electrochemical process and is induced by corrosive ions in the environment. At the onset of corrosion, the electrochemical potential at the corroding site changes. Hence, in this project polymer based nanocapsules will be developed that will inhibit corrosion by multiple mechanisms. The nanocapsules themselves will prevent corrosion by acting as ionic barrier between metal and toxic ions as well as by anodic passivation. If the passivation or the barrier effect fails due to scratch or mechanical damage and the metal starts to corrode, the change in electrochemical potential on the corroding metal surface will activate the nanocapsules to release corrosion inhibitors encapsulated in the capsules at the corroding site. This phase I project will develop a method to synthesize smart, self-healing nanocapsules encapsulated with corrosion inhibitor. These nanocapsules will deliver a next-generation, water-based, acrylic, epoxy or polyurethane based anticorrosive coatings into the market.