Preparation and Characterization of Transparent and UV-Shielding Epoxy/SR-494/APTMS/ZnO Nanocomposites with High Heat Resistance and Anti-Static Properties.

This research is to develop transparent and UV-shielding Epoxy/SR-494/APTMS/ZnO nanocomposite materials with high heat resistant and anti-static properties. Firstly, the APTMS (3-(acryloxypropyl)trimethoxysilane) performs the silanol intermediates by hydrolysis in pH 4∼5 acid solution. The inorganic anti-static fillers of powder ZnO can be successfully coupled and crosslinked to Epoxy/SR-494 organic matrixes with these silanols of APTMS coupling agents. The remained active -OH functional groups of the APTMS/ZnO complexes can network bonding with epoxy prepolymers. Therefore, the Epoxy/APTMS/ZnO complexes with good anti-static composites will be successfully prepared. Finally, in order to improve the thermal resistant and mechanical properties, the polyfunctionalized SR-494 (pentaery-thritol tetracrylate) acrylate monomers and the Epoxy/APTMS/ZnO composites are chain polymerized to form an excellent cross-linking structure of organic/inorganic nanocomposites. The chemical bonding formation and the best weight contents of reaction components are identified by FT-IR spectra. The thermal resistance, transparence, surface electric resistance, and hardness of these nanocomposites are measured by TGA, DSC, UV-Visible, surface resistant meter, and pencil hardness tester respectively. Experimental results show that these nanocomposites have 90% transmittance and the best Td value is 389.3 °C which is 109.0 °C and 78.6 °C higher than those of pure epoxy resin and pure SR-494 acrylate resin respectively. The glass transition temperature is not detected below 200 °C. The surface electric resistances of Epoxy/SR-494/APTMS/ZnO hybrid thin films are decreased from 3.14 × 1013 to 5.13 × 107 Ω/cm2. The hardness of these nanocomposites is as high as 8H, and those hybrid films have high UV-shielding properties. The morphology structures of the hybrid thin films are estimated by SEM. The results show that the optical thin films are evenly distributed with inorganic colloidal particles and the average particle size of these nanocomposites is 45∼80 nm, while the powder ZnO (particle size: 2∼5 μm) was used as inorganic filler. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]