Material Science
Nanoscale Fletching Unlocks PFAS-Free Non-Stick Coating
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Teflon’s Importance & Problems
Since its invention in the late 1930s, Teflon, also known as polytetrafluoroethylene or PTFE, has become famous for its ability to repel water, oil, and grease alike.
It is not only used in non-stick pans, its more well-known application, but is also important in lining of pipes & tanks, for reducing friction in machinery, in medical devices (catheters, surgery), and the aerospace industry.
However, the family of chemicals to which Teflon belongs, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), is increasingly controversial.
This is because they are part of the so-called “forever chemicals”. These chemicals, including PFAS, resist the normal processes that would break down other organic molecules over time.
As a consequence, PFAS are known to accumulate in biological tissues, and their concentrations can become amplified as they travel up the food chain.
Source: King County
So an alternative to using PFAS, or at least less of them and less harmful ones, is needed. This is just what researchers at the University of Toronto have discovered.
They published their discovery in Nature Communications1, under the title “Nanoscale fletching of liquid-like polydimethylsiloxane with single perfluorocarbons enables sustainable oil-repellency”.
PFAS Poisoning The Environment
A Unique Chemical Class
PFAS are a class of thousands of synthetic chemicals that contain carbon-fluorine bonds. This is a very large group of chemicals, with more than 15,000 formulations created over the past decades.
Source: Ansys
PTFE/Teflon, a PFAS chemical, is corrosion- and high-heat-resistant, and has very low surface friction. This last property (PTFE has one of the lowest coefficients of friction of any solid) mostly drives its usage, with the corrosion and heat resistance mostly used as a coating in aerospace and chemical industry applications.
The inertness of carbon-fluorine bonds is responsible for the non-stick properties of PFAS. But it is the same inertness that makes it ultra-persistent as a pollutant.
Because PFAS stay in the environment, they leach into freshwater from industrial uses and waste fills, and end up polluting the rivers, oceans, and agricultural soils. The duration of PFAS in the environment is still unknown to this day, but likely in the range of at least centuries.
Source: AE2S
A Public Health Issue
PFAS can bioaccumulate, which means the piling up of more absorbed chemicals than the body can excrete. This phenomenon can pile up over the food chain, with typically predatory animals like sea fish displaying high concentrations of these types of chemicals.
PFAS are today found in the blood of 97% of Americans. In theory, blood levels of PFOS and PFOA in people have been reduced since those chemicals were removed from consumer products in the early 2000s. However, new PFAS chemicals have been created, and exposure to them is difficult to assess.
PFAS are toxic at high concentrations, with among the known effects:
- Damage to the liver.
- PFAS exposure reduces bone density in adolescents.
- Delaying the onset of puberty in girls, which can lead to a higher incidence of breast cancer, renal disease, and thyroid disease.
- It could cause birth defects.
High-fiber diets and folate-rich diets might provide some protection against these chemicals, but are unlikely to fully protect from them either.
Why PFAS Are Hard to Replace
Despite the risks, the lack of alternatives means that PFAS remain ubiquitous in consumer products: they are still widely used not only in cookware, but also in rain-resistant fabrics, food packaging, and even in makeup.
“The challenge is that while it’s easy to create a substance that will repel water, it’s hard to make one that will also repel oil and grease to the same degree. Scientists had hit an upper limit to the performance of these alternative materials.”
If PFAS are impossible to fully remove from our industrial society, at least they could be made less harmful. In that context, the longest PFAS, which have been banned (more than 8 carbon atoms), and the somewhat short ones (4-6 carbon atoms) are to be avoided.
“What we’ve seen in the literature, and even in the regulations, is that it’s the longest-chain PFAS that are getting banned first, with the shorter ones considered much less harmful.
Our hybrid material provides the same performance as what had been achieved with long-chain PFAS, but with greatly reduced risk.”
As regulations tighten around PFAS pollution, alternatives are urgently needed for the chemical industry.
Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)
The researchers at the University of Toronto are working with PDMS, a material generally commercialized under the category of “silicone”.
To bring this material to the same anti-adhesion performance as Teflon, the researchers used PFAS with only one carbon atom in its side chain (a single carbon with three fluorines on it). Not only are these less toxic, but when they finally degrade, they produce trifluoroacetic acid(TFA), which, while much less likely to bioaccumulate in human tissues, is still environmentally persistent and can pose risks to aquatic life in high concentrations.
They used PDMS brush, which includes many irregular spikes of silicon. They then used a technique called fletching, adding the PFAS to the silicon structures at the nanoscale.
Source: Nature Communications
“If you were able to shrink down to the nanometre scale, it would look a bit like the feathers that you see around the back end of an arrow, where it notches to the bow. That’s called fletching, so this is nanoscale fletching.
We were able to bond about seven of the shortest possible PFAS molecules to the end of each PDMS bristle. ”
Testing Anti-Adhesive Properties
To test the properties of the new silicon-PFAS fletched material, the scientists designed an oil spray test where the surfaces were subjected to a continuous spray of oil/hydrocarbons (decane, octane, or heptane).
Source: Nature Communications
On a scale developed by the American Association of Textile Chemists and Colorists, the new coating achieved a grade of 6, placing it on par with many standard PFAS-based coatings.
Source: Nature Communications
Testing Applications
The new material needs to be applied to other surfaces to become useful, like pipes, surgical material, or the bottom of cooking pans. So this was tested as well.
The researchers applied the newly invented material to nylon, aluminum, and polyester, and proved it can effectively shed droplets of various surface tensions and viscosities.
Source: Nature Communications
This was an important test, as many surfaces requiring anti-adhesive properties are rough or porous, and the PDMS brushes coated in ultra-short PFAS needed to work with this type of material.
| Test Surface | Repellency Achieved | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Nylon | High | Effectively shed oil and water droplets |
| Aluminum | High | Suitable for industrial machinery |
| Polyester | High | Effective even on porous textiles |
Conclusion
The leader of the scientific team says the team is open to collaborating with manufacturers of non-stick coatings who might wish to scale up and commercialize the process.
They will also keep working on improving their concept even further.
“The holy grail of this field would be a substance that outperforms Teflon, but with no PFAS at all. We’re not quite there yet, but this is an important step in the right direction.”
Investing in Chemical Producers
Chemours
(CC )
Chemours is a spin-off from chemical industry giant DuPont, based in the US. It is a specialist in titanium oxide production, as well as the producer of Teflon. It also produces refrigeration gases.
By far, titanium is the main part of the business, with more than half of the company’s revenues.
Source: Chemours
Chemours mostly sells to North America (45%), followed by Asia Pacific (24%) and EMEA (20%).
The refrigerant section contains the older Freon, and the newer Opteon with much less emission of greenhouse gases.
The advanced material segment includes anti-adhesive Teflon, flexible material Viton, high-performance lubricants Krytox, and membrane Nafion.
Source: Chemours
Nafion can be used for water purification and desalination, as well as hydrogen production and utilization in fuel cells.
Teflon applications go much beyond non-stick pans and include supporting the production of wind turbine blades, as a binder in EV batteries, a seal to reduce CO2 emissions, or as a binder in electrodes for hydrogen production.
Despite PFAS-related controversies, Teflon has recently been approved for use in semiconductors. This makes Chemours the only U.S.-based PFA resin manufacturer, crucial for a secure supply chain under the CHIPS and Science Act.
Overall, Chemours is a highly specialized chemistry company, with strong leadership in its segment inherited from its former parent company, DuPont.
In addition to titanium, it also holds some valuable specialty chemical IP. From emissions refrigerant to hydrogen production and utilization, Chemours is likely to benefit from the trends of reduction in carbon emissions, as well as the world’s growing demand for paints and colorants.
Its branding power and commercial relations would also make it an ideal partner to the University of Toronto researchers to develop alternatives to Teflon, which is today only a trademark name, but not protected by patent IP rights.
Latest Chemours (CC) Stock News and Developments
Study Referenced
1. Au, S., Gauthier, J.R., Kumral, B. et al. Nanoscale fletching of liquid-like polydimethylsiloxane with single perfluorocarbons enables sustainable oil-repellency. Nature Communications. 16, 6789 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-62119-9
