PANI-chitosan-TiO2 ternary nanocomposite and its effectiveness on antibacterial and antistatic behavior of epoxy coating

A straightforward approach has been developed for fabricating antibacterial and antistatic epoxy coatings by using polyaniline-chitosan modified TiO₂ ternary nanocomposite. This nanocomposite was synthesized through the following steps. First, chitosan was grafted onto the TiO₂ nanoparticles and then final nanocomposite was prepared via solution polymerization of aniline. Electrical conductivity measurement revealed that nanocomposite with 7.5 wt % of the modified TiO₂ nanoparticles has noticeably higher conductivity compared to polyaniline. Evaluating the coatings' antibacterial property indicated epoxy coatings with the content of ternary nanocomposite show significant bactericidal activity against Gram-positive bacteria and have acceptable antibacterial action against Gram-negative ones. Also, obtained results showed that the ternary nanocomposite would greatly decrease coatings' surface resistivity and when nanocomposite content is about 2 wt % surface resistivity is about 3 × 10⁷ Ω sq⁻¹. On the contrary, the coating with nanocomposite loading exhibits improved thermal and mechanical performance compared to the coating made of neat epoxy. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 136, 47629.