Recent Development on Self-Cleaning Cementitious Coatings

The recent improvements in nano-technologies applied to building coatings are reported, starting from the historical origins of the research on photocatalysis. The description of the main air pollutants and the chemical mechanism of photocatalysis introduce to self-cleaning surfaces and the super-hydrophilic and hydrophobic attitude. Self-cleaning cementitious surfaces, due to nano-structured photocatalysts, mainly titanium dioxide, show environmental benefit in reduction of air pollutants and many experimental evidences are reported together with several applications on building construction. International standards and main spectroscopic techniques aim to evaluate the benefit in terms of air pollutants reduction and self-cleaning effect, related to the durability of colour surfaces. Some researches in progress propose new developments and innovations to the building surfaces.