The effect of cerium ion and CeO2 nanoparticles on the formation and corrosion behavior of self-healing CeO2-chitosan (CeO2-CHIT) nanocomposite coatings on AA5083-H321 was studied by SEM, TEM, XPS, FTIR, potentiodynamic polarization and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. High corrosion resistance coating was obtained when the cerium ion concentration in the chitosan (CHIT) films was 5 mM. It has been observed that the presence of 5gr.lit-1 CeO2 nanoparticles in the CHIT coatings doped with cerium ions (CHIT-CE) provided higher corrosion resistance. This coating showed high impedance after the 12 hours of immersion in 3.5% NaCl. With further increase in immersion time from 12 to 24, 48 and 72 hours, this trend continued to increase in corrosion resistant. The progressive increase in the impedance values of CeO2-CHIT-Ce (5 mM) coatings with increasing time of immersion showed that this coating exhibits ‘self-healing” type behavior.
