Abstract

Corrosion inhibition of mild steel was studied using LDopa in aqueous hydrochloric acid and sulphuric acid solutions. The corrosion behaviors of the steel specimen in the presence of inhibitor were studied by galvanostatic polarization and weight loss techniques. The measured electrochemical data indicated good inhibition of corrosion in both the corrosive medium in presence of LDOPA. The corrosion inhibition may be explained on the basis of adsorption and formation of surface film of LDOPA on the metal surface. The surface of the steel specimen subjected to electrochemical corrosion in the presence and absence of the inhibitor was studied using scanning electron microscopic images.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Introduction Experimental Results and Observations Conclusions Acknowledgement

Introduction
Corrosion is destructive attack of metal by its environment. Inhibitors are generally used to protect materials against

deterioration from corrosion. Many organic compounds containing oxygen, nitrogen and sulphur or functional group such as -CHO, -N=N, R-OH etc. have been used as corrosion inhibitor for metal. Only a few are non-toxic and eco-friendly compounds. Eg. Tryptamine, Succinic acid, L-ascorbic acid, Sulphamethoxazole and Cefatrexyl were found to be effective inhibitors for acid environments. Amines are effective inhibitors for steel corrosion in acidic solution and dithioburates was found to exhibit the best performance towards the corrosion of mild steel in HCl solutions

 The efficiency of an organic compound as an inhibitor is

mainly dependent on its ability to get adsorbed on metal surface which consists of a replacement of water molecule at a corroding interface. The inhibition action of these drugs was attributed to blocking the surface via formation of insoluble complexes on the metal surface. In the present paper L-DOPA was used as corrosion inhibitor for mild steel in aqueous Hydrochloric acid and Sulphuric acid solutions. The corrosion inhibition efficiency of the compound was studied by potentiodynamic polarization and weight loss studies. The surface morphology of the metal surface before and after corrosion is studied by SEM images.

Experimental
L-DOPA used as corrosion inhibitor has following

structure

 The corrosion protection performance of these

coatings was investigated in aqueous hydrochloric acid and sulphuric acid media using potentiodynamic polarization and weight loss methods. Weight loss measurements were carried out by weighing the mild steel specimen before and after immersion in 100cm3 acid solutions for different time intervals in the presence and absence of various concentrations of L-dopa. Duplicate experiments were performed in each case and the mean value of the weight loss was determined.

 For the polarization measurements, a conventional three

electrode pyrex glass cell consisting of a saturated calomel electrode (SCE), the mild steel specimen and a platinum foil as reference, working and counter electrodes respectively were used. The anodic and cathodic polarization values were measured under galvanostatic conditions. The potential of the working electrode varied from the open circuit potential at the rate of 20mV per min and steady values were noted using an ELICO potentiostat / Galvanostat (Model CL-95). Anodic and cathodic tafel lines were constructed and corrosion rates and percentage inhibition efficiencies were calculated.

The percentage inhibition efficiency () was calculated using the following relation where I0 corr and Icorr are the corrosion current densities before and after treatment.

Surface morphology of the modified steel surface

before and after corrosion study was recorded using JOEL-JEM-1200 EX-II electron microscope.

Result and Discussions

1. Weight loss measurements

Corrosion behavior of mild steel can be characterized by inhibition efficiency factor in absence and presence of inhibitor compound.

where W0 and W are the weight-losses in the absence and presence of the inhibitor in both the corrosive media

At a concentration of 0.015M L-Dopa exhibits maximum inhibition efficiency (68%) in HCl and sulphuric acid solution (71%) as shown in Table 1. Since Percent IE of the inhibitor was increased with an increase in the concentration it is clear that the increase in inhibition inhibitor concentration enhances the inhibition.

2. Polarization study

the corrosion behavior can be explained in terms of various electrochemical parameters under the polarization curve (figs. 2,3). These parameters are namely corrosion potential (Ecorr), corrosion current density (Icorr) , anodic(ba) and cathodic(bc) tafel slopes.

From the table 2 and 3, it is found that the corrosion current density decreases and % IE increases with the increase in concentration of inhibitor.

3.

Adsorption isotherms The corrosion mechanism or the process is better understood with help of adsorption isotherms.

In the fig(4) the Plots of log / (1- ) versus log C are found to be linear, hence the corrosion process is found to follow freundlich adsorption isotherm. i.e. the inhibitor gets adsorbed on to the corrosion surface.

4. Scanning electron microscopic studies(SEM)

It gave us the image or the photograph of the metal surface, where we can compare the uniformity of the surface in the presence of the inhibitor with the corroded surface in the absence of the inhibitor.

Conclusions
Corrosion of the mild steel in acidic medium is found

to be greatly minimized by the use of L-dopa. Inhibition efficiency increases with increase in the concentration of L-dopa. The inhibition process follows Langmuir adsorption isotherm. The SEM photographs shows the formation of insoluble non-porous film on the metal surface.

Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Central Department of Chemistry(CDC),TU for providing me an opportunity to present this seminar presentation paper. I would like to thank my respected teachers Dr. Rameshwor Adhikari, Dr. Deba Bahadur khadka and Dr. Kshama Parajuli for guiding me for the task. Lastly, I would express my gratitude to my dear friend Mr. Sanjip Kumar Sapkota for providing his kind support in completing the work.