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Highly Exfoliated Natural Rubber/Clay Composites by “Propping‐Open Procedure”: The Influence of Fatty‐Acid Chain Length on Exfoliation
Author(s) -
Rooj Sandip,
Das Amit,
Stöckelhuber Klaus Werner,
Reuter Uta,
Heinrich Gert
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
macromolecular materials and engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.913
H-Index - 96
eISSN - 1439-2054
pISSN - 1438-7492
DOI - 10.1002/mame.201100185
Subject(s) - materials science , exfoliation joint , nanocomposite , vulcanization , ultimate tensile strength , composite material , curing (chemistry) , natural rubber , composite number , graphene , nanotechnology
A high degree of exfoliation of MMT in NR is achieved by using the so‐called “propping‐open approach” in which a stepwise expansion of the interlayer spacing of MMT takes place. The nanostructure is characterized by WAXD and TEM which indicate different extents of clay dispersion depending on the fatty‐acid chain length. Curing kinetics of different nanocomposites is studied and interestingly low activation energies of the vulcanization process are observed in the case of NR/EMMT nanocomposites. The incorporation of EMMT dramatically affects composite properties whereas DMA indicates significant reduction of tan δ peak height and the tensile strength approximately doubles from 14 to 30 MPa with only 5 phr EMMT.