The quality of the interfacial protective layer induced by polyaniline (PANI) has been claimed to play a crucial role for the enhanced corrosion protection of Mg alloy, but its growth behavior is not well understood. Here some composition, structure and growth kinetics of the protective layer formed at the PANI-emeraldine base (EB) coating/AZ91D Mg alloy interface were investigated to explore the growth mechanism. Upon immersion in 0.5 M NaCl solution, the growing interface layer under EB coating exhibited a fast passivation rate and an increased corrosion resistance, which was largely influenced by ion concentration. XPS depth profiles showed that the EB-induced layer was a mixture of MgO and Mg(OH) 2 , in which no significant bi-layer structure existed and MgO was dominant throughout the bulk film. These observations suggest that the interaction between EB and Mg can promote the faster growth of a stable MgO-rich layer mixed with Mg(OH) 2 probably by solid reaction. Meanwhile less hydration of MgO and dissolution-precipitation reaction occur, thus leading to less Mg(OH) 2 in the outer layer. Magnesium alloys have drawn great attention in automotive and aerospace industry due to their excellent properties such as low density and high specific strength. However, limited corrosion resistance of such alloys has retarded their widespread applications. To improve the corrosion resistance of Mg alloys, numerous coating techniques have been explored, among which organic coating containing corrosion inhibiting pigments is an economical and effective method in industry. One important pigment for Mg alloys is polyaniline (PANI) including emeraldine salt form (ES) and emeraldine base form (EB).
1-6Its highly efficient corrosion-protection performance for Mg alloys has been shown to be competitive to a chromate-pigmented coating. Additionally, self-healing capability was also found on a hybrid solgel/PANI coated Mg alloy upon immersing in Harrison's solution, where no pitting or filiform corrosion occurred around the scratched area while a protective layer was formed.8 Sathiyanarayanan et al. 1 and Wang et al. 8 observed that, after an initial decrease upon immersion in corrosive electrolytes, the complex impedance of PANI coated Mg alloy recovered, which was attributed to the formation of a protective layer. The different chemical composition on the EB-induced protective layer surface was already confirmed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) in comparison with that formed underneath a varnish coating.
2,6The mechanism of PANI promoting a protective layer formation has been mostly supported by extensive studies in various metal systems.9-14 Nevertheless, few works have been done to understand the protective layer growth behavior. The most intractable issue of how the interaction between PANI and metal induces the protective layer growth still remains unsolved.9 This is attributed primarily to the great difficulty in in-situ investigation on the growth kinetics of interfacial layer formed beneath a coating. Electroche...