Oxygen Permeability Properties of Zwitterionic Polymer Coatings

Abstract

Indigenous communities in Canada have long suffered from poor water security due to a combination of political, environmental, and social factors. Concerns regarding the health of community waters in the Six Nations of the Grand River reserve prompted the desire for a solution which provided a qualitative assessment of these waters. A distributed network of water quality monitoring stations (WQMSs) measuring five common water quality parameters was installed along the McKenzie Creek around an area the community found to need monitoring. Since monitoring any aquatic environment leads to the attachment of microorganisms and macromolecules to instrumentation, which can disrupt the flow of analyte, it is essential to reduce these foulants to prevent sensor signal bias. However, some antifouling (AF) coatings can reduce transmembrane analyte flow. As such, a series of zwitterionic polymer coatings was developed to assess the permeability of oxygen through a dissolved oxygen (DO) sensor membrane to determine its data collection integrity. Zwitterionic coatings were found to slow the oxygen transfer rate significantly but without compromising the rapidity of field readouts. WQMSs were able to collect and relay live data, but errors in accuracy and consistency need to be fixed before more widespread implementation of these systems can be adopted. Finally, a framework was developed to guide scientists and engineers researching Indigenous lands and resources, drawing from existing literature and firsthand experiences collaborating with Indigenous communities.