Developing super-hydrophobic and corrosion-resistant coating on magnesium-lithium alloy via one-step hydrothermal processing

Formation of super-hydrophobic and corrosion-resistant coatings can provide significant corrosion protection to magnesium alloys. However, it remains a grand challenge to produce such coatings for magnesium-lithium alloys due to their high chemical reactivity. Herein, a one-step hydrothermal processing was developed using a stearic-acid-based precursor medium, which enables the hydrothermal conversion and the formation of low surface energy materials concurrently to produce the super-hydrophobic and corrosion-resistant coating. The multiscale microstructures with nanoscale stacks and microscale spheres on the surface, as well as the through-thickness stearates, lead to the super-hydrophobicity and excellent corrosion resistance of the obtained coating.& COPY; 2021 Chongqing University. Publishing services provided by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of KeAi Communications Co. Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ ) Peer review under responsibility of Chongqing University