RHEOLOGICAL CHARACTERIZATION OF POLYCAPROLACTONE/CLAY NANOCOMPOSITES: A METHOD TO COMPARE CLAY DISPERSION DEGREE

LEANDRO LUDUEÑA; ANALIA VAZQUEZ; VERA ALVAREZ

Los Cocos, Cordoba, Argentina

Simposio; Archipol ´09; 2009

The use of biodegradable polymer such us polycaprolactone (PCL) is increasing due to environmental concerns. In order to become PCL in a more competitive material, nanofillers like clays can be incorporated to it. Nanocomposites have best performance than conventional microcomposites but the effect of enhancing the properties of the matrix is strongly influenced by the dispersion degree of the particles inside the matrix which is commonly characterized by X-ray diffractometry (XRD) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Nevertheless, these techniques are limited to small regions of the sample. Several authors have found that melt rheology is strongly influenced by nanoparticles, founding that as more dispersed the clay particles are, more pronounced the shear thinning behaviour becomes. In exfoliated nanocomposites edge to face interactions of the silicate platelets may build and mechanically stabilize mesoscale structures known as cardhouse promoting a pseudo-solid like rheologic behaviour. This method has the advantage of giving information about the whole sample and not from small zones of it. In this work the dispersion degree of modified and unmodified clays inside PCL is to be characterized by rheological measurements and verified by XRD and TEM analysis.