Graft Copolymers for Blend Compatibilization. Mathematical Modeling of the Grafting Process

GIANOGLIO PANTANO, IOANA A.; ASTEASUAIN, MARIANO; SARMORIA, CLAUDIA; BRANDOLIN, ADRIANA

Salt Lake City, EEUU

Congreso; 2010 AIChE Annual Meeting; 2010

AICHE

We study the process of grafting of polyethylene (PE) onto polystyrene (PS) through a Friedel-Crafts reaction, which results in a mixture of unmodified PE, modified PS and a PE-g-PS copolymer. With the correct composition and block lengths in the graft copolymer, this material may be suitable for compatibilization of the immiscible mixtures in the household plastic waste stream. To aid in the development of such a compatibilization scheme, we present a model for predicting the complete molecular weight distribution of the homopolymers, and the chemical composition distribution of the graft copolymer. For this purpose we use probability generating functions. The resulting model has potential for its application in an optimization tool for the compatibilization process, as it is able to account for the opposing effects of competing reactions that characterize the studied graft reaction.