Flash spinning polyethylene/Fe3O4 magnetic drive fibers for oil absorption underwater

Oil pollution in water has destructive effect on the ecological environment of water bodies. However, the treatments for oil pollution underwater in irregularly shaped and non-open environments face a challenge owing to the difficulty in driving oil absorption materials underwater. Herein, this work reports a facile strategy to prepare flash spinning magnetic polyethylene fibers (FSMPFs) for oil absorption application in irregularly shaped and non-open underwater environments. The as-prepared FSMPFs exhibit good oil absorption performance, of which the oil absorption in air and underwater is 76.70 g/g and 65.32 g/g, respectively, and the FSMPFs can maintain their oil absorption performance in environments with different salinities (1–5 %) and pH values (2–12). Also, the FSMPFs show good magnetic responsiveness and controllability when applied to oil–water separation underwater in irregularly shaped pipes, and the oil–water separation efficiency of FSMPFs for oil–water emulsion reaches 99.6 %. Besides, the FSMPFs have good mechanical properties and reusability, of which the tensile strength and elongation at break is 185.9 cN and 41.2 %, respectively, and oil absorption is 76.28 g/g (99.5 % of the initial value) after 10 cycles of absorption–desorption. The FSMPFs have great potential in practical applications for oil absorption under irregularly shaped and non-open environments.