Double crosslinking strategy for optimizing properties of waterborne UV-cured coating in radioactive decontamination applications

With the advancement of nuclear industry driving extensive applications of peelable decontamination coatings in nuclear facility decommissioning and emergency situations, current coatings face challenges in balancing cohesion-adhesion properties, as their high peel strength prevents complete removal from high surface energy substrates. In this work, a double crosslinking network strategy is developed, integrating flexible Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) and chitosan polycondensation crosslinked long chains with rigid acrylic and acrylamide radical crosslinked short chains, synergistically enhancing waterborne peelable coating strength via energy dissipation mechanisms. At the same time, the complexation between -OH and -COO − groups on the molecular chain and Cs + is exploited to achieve efficient decontamination effect. The prepared peelable coating demonstrates some advantages, including multiple substrate applications with rapid curing rate, enhanced mechanical strength compared to single-crosslinked network coatings (with a tensile strength of 2 MPa and an elongation at break of 410 %), and low interfacial adhesion (with a peel strength <2.2 N/cm on cement surfaces). Remarkably, it achieves high decontamination efficiencies of 99.70 % on glass surfaces, 99.68 % on stainless steel surfaces and 92.40 % on concrete surfaces, while possessing robust solvent resistance. Therefore, the prepared decontamination coating has excellent potential with widespread application prospects in the field of radioactive surface decontamination.