Shaving article with surface modification
A method of making a shaving article comprising a substrate comprising stainless steel; and an external polymer coating comprising polymer brushes, the method comprising the steps of: providing said substrate; providing a initiating species comprising an anchor group that is chemically reactive with surface moieties on the substrate, and a polymerization initiator group; reacting said anchor group with said surface moieties of the substrate; providing monomers reactive for polymerization with the polymerization initiator; and polymerizing the monomers with the initiator group of the initiating species.
1. A method of making a shaving article comprising:
a substrate comprising stainless steel; and
a polymer coating comprising polymer brushes, the method comprising the steps of:
a. providing said substrate;
b. providing an initiating species comprising an anchor group that is chemically reactive with surface moieties on the substrate, and a polymerization initiator group, the polymerization initiator group is an alkyl halide;
c. reacting said anchor group with said surface moieties of the substrate;
d. providing monomers reactive for polymerization with the polymerization initiator; and
e. polymerizing the monomers with the initiator group of the initiating species.
2. The method of claim 1 wherein the substrate in step a. comprises hydroxy groups or oxo groups.
3. The method of claim 2 including the step of treating the substrate to increase the surface density of hydroxy groups and/or oxo groups prior to step c.
4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the anchor group is selected from the group consisting of acrylate groups, hydroxy groups, silane groups, and phosphonic acid groups.
5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the silane group is selected from the group consisting of alkoxylsilane groups and halide silane groups.
6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the anchor group is an alkoxysilane group having the formula Si(OR) 3 , where R is a lower alkyl group.
7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the halide is selected from the group consisting of Br and Cl.
8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the initiating species comprises 2-bromo-2-methyl-N-(3-(triethoxysilyl)propyl) propanamide.
9. The method of claim 1 , wherein polymerization step e. involves atom transfer radical polymerization.
10. The method of claim 1 , wherein in steps d. and e. a block copolymer is generated, said block copolymer preferably having a proximal hydrophobic block and a distal hydrophilic block.