In July 2024, The team of Wang Kaituo from SKL is entitled "Preparation of lightweight porous slag-based geopolymer highly hydrophobic materials for efficient oil-water separation" was published in the Construction and Building Materials.

Surface hydrophobic modification is a critical technology for enhancing the application properties of materials, crucial for the development of geopolymer materials in oil-water separation. in this study, a lightweight porous slag-based geopolymer highly hydrophobic materials (PSGHHMs) were successfully prepared in-situ using slag and liquid water glass by varying different influencing factors, such as the amount of water/foaming agent/polymethylhydrosiloxane (PMHS) and the curing temperature. The PSGHHMs exhibited high strength, large flux and excellent highly hydrophobic properties, with contact angle reaching 156.14° and a sliding angle of less than 2°. SEM-EDS, TG-DSC and FT-IR analysis reveal that the in-situ modification mechanism of PSGHHMs involves the hydrolysis of Si-H in PMHS under alkaline conditions to form Si-OH. This subsequently reacts with Ca-OH in C-S-H gel to produce Ca-O-Si. Consequently, the PSGHHMs retained their excellent highly hydrophobicity even after calcination at 450℃ for 2.5 h. The PSGHHMs demonstrated robust resistance to acid/alkali/salt corrosion, as well as to friction, with the ability to quickly restore damaged highly hydrophobic properties. Additionally, the PSGHHMs could quickly absorb light/heavy oils, and achieving a desorption efficiency of over 99 %. They were also capable of continuously separation of oil-in-water emulsions and oil-water mixtures. Given these properties, the PSGHHMs have broad potential applications in antifreezing, antifogging, drag reduction and oil-water separation.