Characterization of polystyrene nanocomposites containing nanoparticles of pseudoboehmite obtained by sol-gel process

Abstract

Polymeric nanocomposites are hybrid materials in which inorganic substances of nanometric dimensions are dispersed in a polymeric matrix. These inorganic substances have high surface area allowing a better interaction with the polymeric matrix and consequently promote changes in the physical properties of the final composite with small additions of the same. The preparation of nanocomposites with polymer matrix allows in many cases to find a relationship between a low cost due to the use of lower amount of charge, reaching high level of performance. In this work, it was obtained polystyrene nanocomposites with pseudoboehmite synthesized by the solgel process with different concentrations of pseudoboehmite using and not using octadecylamine as a coupling agent. The nanocomposites were prepared by the melt intercalation technique. The pseudoboehmite nanoparticles were characterized by X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, differential thermal analysis and thermo gravimetric analysis. The nanocomposites were characterized by differential thermal analysis, thermogravimetric analysis, heat deflection temperature, Vicat softening point, mechanical and rheological tests. The results showed an increase in the thermal properties, hardness and tensile strength values and decrease in the melt index, impact resistance and tensile elongation, showing the interaction of the filler with the polymer matrix. Although in the samples with the presence of octadecylamine the data shows that the thermomechanical properties practically do not vary in relation with the samples without octadecylamine.