Novel superhydrophobic and superoleophilic sawdust as a selective oil sorbent for oil spill cleanup

Oil spill pollution has been aggravating current situation of water shortages, thus people pay more attention to collecting oil from water by using efficient oil adsorption materials which are of necessity for water protection. In the present study, sawdust was triumphantly endowed with simultaneous performances of superhydrophobicity and superoleophilicity. Analytical results disclosed that superhydrophobic and superoleophilic properties of sawdust product were resulted from the deposition of silica (SiO2) particles on polystyrene-coated fiber surface and chemical modification by self-assembled octadecyltrichlorosilane (OTS) monomers. Notably, the proposed superhydrophobic/superoleophilic sawdust with water contact angle of 153 degrees and oil contact angle of 0 degrees was employed as an oil sorbent to separate oil from water, it continuously absorbed oil while completely repelling water, providing strong evidences for its highly promising for the application in the field of spilled oil disposal. (C) 2015 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of The Institution of Chemical Engineers.