Tailoring of thin polymer films chemisorbed onto conductive surfaces by electrografting

Cathodic electrografting is an efficient technique to impart adhesion to poly(meth)acrylate coatings onto inorganic conducting surfaces. Although this technique was restricted for many years to very few monomers ((meth)acrylonitrile) and to deposition of very thin polymer films, recent developments have overcome these limitations. First of all, the judicious choice of the solvent has proved to be a powerful lever to increase the range of the chemisorbed polymers, including functional polymers. Quite interestingly, classical controlled polymerization techniques have been combined with cathodic electrografting as a powerful strategy for tuning thickness, properties and reactivity of the chemisorbed organic films. At the time being, cathodic electrografting has contributed to substantial progress in very demanding applications, such as protection against corrosion, food packaging, biomaterials, sizing of reinforcing agents in polymer composites and sensoring devices.