Opposite superwetting magnetic stainless-steel mesh for multiple types of oil/water separation

Oil spill accidents and discharge of oily wastewater from human daily life occur frequently. More and more attention has been paid to wettable interface materials for oil/water separation. However, to date, there has been little reports about on-demand and continuous oil/water separation. Therefore, we proposed a simple and environmentally friendly method to construct rough surface structure by spraying magnetic Fe3O4 nanoparticles, and modified the surface by attaching dopamine and grafting n-dodecyl mercaptan on dopamine to prepare SSM with opposite wetting properties. The obtained meshes exhibit excellent resistance to mechanical and chemical damages, and can be long-term storage. More importantly, the as-prepared superhydrophilic mesh and superhydrophobic mesh can be used to continuously separate oil-water mixtures with high efficiency. At the same time, they could be controlled by magnetic force, and have the application prospect in sewage treatment, oil-water separation and deep-sea oil leakage treatment.