Thermally Stable and Flame Retardant Polymer Nanocomposites

Polymer nanocomposites have revolutionised material performance, most notably in the plastics, automotive and aerospace industries. However, in order to be commercially viable, many of these materials must withstand high temperatures. In this book, leaders in the field outline the mechanisms behind the generation of suitable polymer systems, pulling together recent research to provide a unified and up-to-date assessment of recent technological advancements. The text is divided into two clear sections, introducing the reader to the two most important requirements for this material type: thermal stability and flame retardancy. Special attention is paid to practical examples, walking the reader through the numerous commercial applications of thermally stable and flame retardant nanocomposites. With a strong focus on placing theory within commercial context, this unique volume will appeal to practitioners as well as researchers.Preface; Part I. Thermal Stability: 1. Polymer nanocomposites: layered silicates, surface modifications and thermal stability V. Mittal; 2. Mechanism of thermal degradation of layered silicates modified with ammonium and other thermally stable salts K. Pielichowski, A. Leszczynska and J. Njuguna; 3. Thermal stability of PS nanocomposites from improved thermally stable organoclays Musa R. Kamal and Jorge Uribe-Calderon; 4. PET nanocomposites using nanoclays modified with thermally stable surfactants Evangelos Manias, Matthew J. Heidecker, Hiroyoshi Nakajima, Marius C. Costache and Charles A. Wilkie; 5. Thermally stable polyimide/BAPS modified clay nanocomposites Joshua U. Otaigbe and Vladimir E. Yudin; 6. Clays modified with thermally stable ionic liquids with applications in polyolefin and polylactic acid nanocomposites Marino Xanthos and Jin Uk Ha; Part II. Flame Retardancy: 7. Introduction to flame retardancy of polymer clay nanocomposites Tie Lan and Gunter Beyer; 8. Flame retardant nanocomposites with polymer blends J. Zhang, M. A. Delichatsios, A. Fina, G. Camino, F. Samyn, S. Bourbigot and S. Nazare; 9. Flame retardancy of polyamide/clay nanocomposites Yuan Hu, Lei Song and Qilong Tai; 10. Self-extinguishing polymer clay nanocomposites Miriam H. Rafailovich and Seongchan Pack; 11. Flame retardant polymer nanocomposites with fullerenes as filler Zhengping Fang and Pingan Song; 12. Flame retardant polymer nanocomposites with alumina as filler Jose-Marie Lopez Cuesta and Abdelghani Laachachi; 13. Polymer/layered double hydroxide flame retardant nanocomposites Baojun Qu and Longzhen Qiu; 14. Flame retardant SBS-clay nanocomposites Mauro Comes-Franchini, Massimo Messori, Guido Ori and Cristina Siligardi; Index.