Tuning the surface hydrophobicity of honeycomb porous films fabricated by star-shaped POSS-fluorinated acrylates polymer via breath-figure-templated self-assembly

Porous films with tunable surface morphology and hydrophobicity were prepared via breath figure employing star-shaped polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS)-fluorinated polyacrylates, which were synthesized by atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) to ensure controlled polymer structure and molar mass. The influence of polymer architecture, solution concentration and the type of solvent on the surface morphology of the resulted porous films were evaluated. The optimized porous films with a broad range of pore diameter (D) and rim width (W) were characterized revealing in significant increasing of the surface hydrophobicity. Moreover, the surface morphology of the porous films, characterized by the D/W values (defined as f_a), and surface hydrophobicity were found to have a notable positive correlation. Furthermore, the stripped films from above mentioned porous films were investigated revealing superhydrophobic surface due to the pincushion-like structure. Higher f_a values for stripped films than the related porous film was found.