Theoretical and Experimental Studies of 1-Dodecyl-3-phenylquinoxalin-2(1H)-one as a Sustainable Corrosion Inhibitor for Carbon Steel in Acidic Electrolyte

The anti-corrosion features of 1-dodecyl-3-phenylquinoxalin-2(1H)-one (QO12) for carbon steel CS were evaluated in a 1 M HCl solution using potentiodynamic polarization (PDP), electrochemical impedance (EIS) and UV-visible spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), as well as quantum-chemical methods. The inhibition performance achieves a maximum of 95.33% at 0.001 M. The PDP study revealed that QO12 acts with the character of a mixed-type inhibitor. The EISs mention that the process of corrosion for CS is essentially predominated by the transfer-of-charge mechanism. Moreover, quinoxalinone adsorption follows the Langmuir adsorption isotherm. SEM snapshots show no deterioration after the contribution of QO12 compared to the reference electrolyte. Theoretical calculations suggest that the envisaged inhibitor presents a perfect arrangement capacity through the structure of quinoxalinone.