Nanocomposites of TiO 2 and Siloxane Copolymers as Environmentally Safe Flame-Retardant Materials † |
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| Authors: | Ravi Mosurkal Lynne A Samuelson Kenneth D Smith Phillip R Westmoreland Virinder S Parmar Fadong Yan |
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| Institution: | 1. U.S. Army Natick Soldier Research Development and Engineering Center , Natick, MA;2. Department of Chemical Engineering , University of Massachusetts Amherst , Amherst, MA;3. Bio-organic Laboratory, Department of Chemistry , University of Delhi , Delhi, India;4. Center for Advanced Materials , University of Massachusetts Lowell , Lowell, MA |
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| Abstract: | Composites of titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles and biocatalytically synthesized dimethylsiloxane copolyamides were prepared, and their thermal and flame-retardant properties were investigated. The flammability properties such as heat release capacity and total heat release were measured from microscale cumbustion calorimetry (MCC). The thermal degradation temperatures, char yields, and the heat-release capacities of these nanocomposites were significantly improved over the pure polymers. The heat-release capacities of the siloxane copolymer nanocomposites with 20wt% of TiO2 were found to be 167 and 129 J/g K, which is a 35% less than the pure polymers (260 and 194 J/g K, respectively). The SEM/EDAX surface-analysis studies on nanocomposite films and their char revealed that nanocrystalline-TiO2 plays an important role in forming carbonaceous silicate char on the surface as a protective layer. |
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| Keywords: | Flame retardant polysiloxanes PCFC microcalorimetry TiO2 nanocomposites environmentally-safe heat release capacity |
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