Room-temperature pulsed plasma polymerization of long-chain perfluoroacrylates produces well-adhered liquid-repellent (hydrophobic and oleophobic) films. Critical surface tension values as low as γ c = 4.3 mN m-1 have been measured on coated flat glass substrates. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared, and atomic force microscopy characterization of these surfaces indicates that the low surface energy perfluoroalkyl chains remain intact, while polymerization occurs predominantly via the acrylate carbon−carbon double bond during the plasma duty cycle off-period.

Deposition of low surface energy plasma polymer layers onto microroughened PTFE substrates is found to give rise to high repellency toward polar and nonpolar probe liquids. This behavior has been interpreted in terms of Wenzels theory and the Cassie-Baxter relationship.

Reactive epoxide groups can be directly fixed onto solid surfaces by pulsed plasma polymerization of glycidyl methacrylate. These functionalized substrates are ideally suited for subsequent derivatization chemistries utilizing nucleophilic reagents, and also adhesion promotion.

In this paper, design and control of an isopropyl alcohol (IPA) dehydration process via extractive distillation have been investigated. The heavy-boiling entrainer used to aid the separation is dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO). The design flowsheet includes an extractive distillation column and an entrainer recovery column with the top product of the extractive distillation column to be IPA and the top product of the entrainer recovery column to be water. The bottom product of the entrainer recovery column is the recovered DMSO which is recycled back to the extractive distillation column. The optimal design flowsheet of this complete process has been established showing that the total annual cost and the needed steam cost of this design flowsheet is significantly less than a competing design flowsheet via heterogeneous azeotropic distillation. A very simple overall control strategy has also been proposed which requires only one tray temperature control loop in each column to hold the high-purity specifications of the two products. Dynamic simulations reveal that fixing of the reflux ratio is not a suitable control strategy. Instead, the strategy to fix the two reflux flow rates should be used to reject feed disturbances.

A combination of X-ray photoelectron, infrared, and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopies have shown that pulsed plasma polymerization of 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) leads to the deposition of structurally well-defined poly(HEMA) films. The molecular weight and surface hydroxyl density of these plasma polymer layers can be controlled by varying the electrical discharge pulse duty cycle parameters. These films are found to display hydrogel behavior, and the surface hydroxyl groups readily undergo reaction with diethylchlorophosphite. The latter is shown to be a useful way of coordinating catalytic rhodium complexes to solid surfaces.