Surface treatment with microwave plasma improving PEDOT:PSS adhesion on natural rubber

摘要

Hydrophobic surface of pre-vulcanized natural rubber can be modified to a hydrophilic surface under plasma treatment.This is useful to make flexible and composite substrate from natural rubber in many applications.A low-cost microwave plasma cleaner was built using argon gas as a source for generating plasma.The plasma treatment conditions on rubber were investigated under two parameters:treatment time and treatment cycles.We found that the water contact angle was decreased when the pre-vulcanized natural rubber was treated more time or more cycles.To create the conductivity of natural rubber,poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene)polystyrene sulfonate(PEDOT:PSS)in water was spin on the treated rubber surface.The electrical measurement shows conductivity on the rubber surface with a uniform current-voltage relationship.Without plasma treatment,PEDOT:PSS hardly attached on surface yielding no conductivity appeared on natural rubber.