Aerosol-Assisted Plasma Deposition of Biocomposite Coatings: Investigation of Processing Conditions on Coating Properties

Abstract

The aerosol-assisted atmospheric-pressure planar dielectric-barrier-discharge-type plasma deposition (AA-APPD) system can polymerize monomers and immobilize biomolecules simultaneously. In this paper, we used this technology to deposit biocomposite thin films of polyethylene (PE) along with lysozyme (Lyz) under different aerosol solution temperatures and at different coating positions in the discharge region. In addition, we compared the deposition efficacy of two kinds of Lyz solution using deionized (DI)-water and phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) as solvents, respectively. The results show that deposition rate of thin films increases with increasing solution temperature at most coating positions. In addition, coatings from Lyz-PBS perform higher deposition rates, but with weaker Lyz viability as compared with that of Lyz DI-water. Finally, we also verified that this DBD-type AA-APPD system can not only successfully deposit Lyz in PE thin film, but also maintain Lyz viability after plasma process under different solution temperatures and positions.