Polyurea-crosslinked cationic acrylate copolymer for antibacterial coating

Abstract A novel polyurea-crosslinked cationic acrylate copolymer (PUAM) with antibacterial activity, using 3-(methacryloylamino) propyl trimethyl- ammonium chloride (MPAC) as antibacterial functional monomer, had been successfully synthesized by via soap-free emulsion polymerization. The microscopic morphology analyses from SEM and TEM demonstrated that the resulting PUAM copolymer self-assembled into uniformly dispersed, nearly spherical nanoparticles, and its average diameter was close to 200 nm. The structure analyses consisted of FT-IR, TGA and some other basic performance tests revealed that the acrylate copolymer (PAM) was successfully combined with polyurea, and as expected, PUAM copolymer possessed high thermal stability and excellent mechanical properties. Antibacterial tests indicated that antibacterial monomer introduced here imparted PUAM copolymer emulsion with better dispersion stability and obvious antibacterial activity. Furthermore, the PUAM coating consisted of PUAM emulsion with nano-TiO 2 and other inorganic fillers was also successfully prepared and presented excellent antibacterial activity and mechanical properties. It could be applied as antibacterial coating to prevent the undesirable accumulation of microorganisms on substrate surface.