Designing WS2@Ti3C2Tx heterojunction nanofillers via electrostatic self-assembly for achieving long term corrosion resistance under AHP environment

Despite two-dimensional Ti3C2Tx MXene as a promising candidate for enhancing the anticorrosion capability of epoxy coating, its natural restacking tendency seriously impedes the actual application of Ti3C2Tx/epoxy composite coating. Herein, WS2@Ti3C2Tx heterojunction was synthesized by electrostatic self-assembly, which effectively suppressed the originally self-restacked of both WS2 and Ti3C2Tx nanosheets. After 7 days, WS2@Ti3C2Tx nanohybrid still showed a stable Tyndall effect in the aqueous solution, confirming that heterostructure displayed favorable stability. The synthesized WS2@Ti3C2Tx heterojunction nanohybrid exhibited excellent synergy anticorrosion performance, which was due to that WS2 and Ti3C2Tx nanosheets could compensate for each other's defects. Even after eight cycles immersion under alternating hydrostatic pressure environment, the impedance modulus of WS2@Ti3C2Tx/epoxy composite coating was one order of magnitude higher, and the adhesion strength of WS2@Ti3C2Tx/epoxy coating was still the highest as compared with WS2/epoxy and Ti3C2Tx/epoxy coatings. This work would provide a novel strategy for designing and fabricating heavy-anticorrosion composite coating in deep-sea environment.