A way to toughen up the latex particles used to make emulsion
paints has been developed by UK chemists. The approach involves
adding tiny slivers of clay armor to make the particles more
hard wearing and fire resistant. Until now, latex emulsion
paints have been made by adding a soap-like surfactant molecule
to allow the hydrophobic, or water-hating, polymer ingredients
to mix with water. The surfactant stabilizes the paint mixture
and allows decorators everywhere the chance to slap on a
multitude of colors with a matt or satin finish to walls,
ceilings, and other surfaces. Now, chemist Stefan Bon and
Patrick Colver of the University of Warwick have taken a
different approach. They have found a simple way to individually
coat the prospective paint’s polymer particles with disks of
Laponite clay just a few billionths of a meter in diameter.
These nanodisks, just 1 nanometer thick and 25 nanometers in
diameter, create an armored layer on the individual polymer
latex particles in the paint. Because the Laponite