Organic thin films from novel plasma processes for improved adhesion of composite materials

涉及聚合物膜的若干工业过程包括基于大气压冷等离子体（作为放电产生的电离气体）的表面活化步骤。它们涉及通常称为“电晕”或“介质阻挡放电”的装置，其通过电离空气产生反应性化学物质。这些物质可以与聚合物表面反应，导致极性官能团与表面共价键合。这种方法可以促进聚合物表面被水或极性溶剂基油漆和胶水润湿，否则这些油漆和胶水将难以均匀地施加。由于与大气压下的工业等离子体工艺相关的限制，在过去几十年中，这些工艺几乎没有显著的改进。近年来，大气压等离子体技术已经成为一个非常活跃的研究领域，并且一些发展现在已经成熟用于工业应用。我们的实验室一直在开发用于各种应用的常压等离子体技术沉积的薄有机涂层，现在有一系列用于沉积各种类型涂层的方法。特别令人感兴趣的是由在氮气或空气中高度稀释的乙烯沉积的涂层，氮气或空气是一种相对便宜且无毒的混合物。在与我们的工业合作伙伴CGT公司的初步合作中，我们研究了使用等离子体沉积的有机涂层来改进它们的两种方法：i）将聚丙烯泡沫层压到聚氯乙烯膜上，和i i）将顶面聚氨酯涂层施加到热塑性烯烃膜上。虽然我们没有成功地实现第一个目标，但我们成功地制备了有机涂层，这将成功地促进聚氨酯面漆的粘附。然而，这些涂层是通过低压等离子体工艺沉积的，在CGT的生产线上实施这种工艺成本高昂。本项目旨在开发一种大气压等离子体方法来制备性能良好的类似涂层。一个成功的发展将给我们的合作伙伴一个明显的竞争优势。

Several industrial processes involving polymer films include a surface activation step based on an atmospheric pressure cold plasma (an ionized gas produced as an electrical discharge). They involve devices commonly know as "corona" or "dielectric barrier discharge" treaters which create reactive chemical species by ionizing air. These species can react with polymer surfaces resulting in the covalent bonding of polar functional groups to the surface. Such processes can promote the wetting of polymer surfaces with water or polar solvent based paints and glues, which would otherwise be difficult to apply homogeneously. Due to the constraints associated with industrial plasma processes at atmospheric pressure, these have seen little significant improvement over the last decades. In recent years, atmospheric pressure plasma technology has been a very actively researched field and several developments are now ripe for industrial application. Our laboratory has been developing thin organic coatings deposited by atmospheric pressure plasma technology for various applications and now has a wide array of methods for depositing various types of coatings. Of particular interest are coatings deposited from highly diluted ethylene in nitrogen or air, a mixture that is both relatively inexpensive and non-toxic. In an initial collaboration with our industrial partner, CGT inc., we investigated the use of plasma deposited organic coatings to improve two of their processes: : i) lamination of polypropylene foam to polyvinyl chloride films and ii) application of a top finish polyurethane coating to thermoplastic olefin film. While we were unsuccessful in achieving the first objective, we were successful in preparing organic coatings that would successfully promote the adhesion of the polyurethane top-finish. Those coatings were however deposited by a low-pressure plasma process that would be expensive to implement in CGT's production line. This project aims at developing an atmospheric pressure plasma method to prepare coatings analogous that were found to perform well. A successful development would give our partner a clear competitive advantage.