Synergistic defense: compositional regulation and temperature engineering of TMCs for enhanced microwave absorption and corrosion protection

In the context of abundant marine wind energy resources, offshore wind power presents an effective solution to the current energy crisis, however, the challenges of electromagnetic interference and corrosion faced by offshore wind power generation equipment demand urgent resolution. This study addresses these issues by employing a coordination strategy between deprotonated dopamine and transition metal ions, utilizing compositional regulation and temperature engineering to synthesize a series of carbon/transition metal carbides (TMCs) composite materials. Compositional regulation introduces heterojunction interfaces to enhance dielectric loss, while temperature engineering effectively adjusts the material's impedance matching. WM@C, with an extremely thin thickness of 1.66 mm, demonstrates a remarkable effective absorption bandwidth (EAB) reaching 5.52 GHz, accompanied by a maximum reflection loss (RL) of –26.8 dB. Notably, attributed to the outstanding anti-chloride ion pitting ability of TMCs and the stacking effect of dense carbon nanosheets on the surface, the synthesized composite coatings demonstrate excellent corrosion protection capabilities. After 10 consecutive days of salt spray test, the EAB of the WM@C still maintains 5.01 GHz at 1.76 mm, a new idea of dual-function integrated materials for microwave absorption (MA) and corrosion protection has been developed, providing theoretical support for the construction of offshore wind power generation equipment.