Design of waterborne isocyanate -free poly (hydroxy urethane)s- poly (butyl methacrilate) hybrids via miniemulsion and properties of the cast films

Abstract

The objective of this thesis consists in the development of waterborne hybrid polymers composed of vegetable oil-based poly(hydroxy urethane) PHU and poly(butyl methacrylate) polyBMA. To do so, the design of fatty-acid based bis-cyclic carbonates, as well as their behavior in the bulk polymerization with fatty-acid based diamines was firstly studied. The bis-cyclic carbonate structure was found to influence the microstructure of the formed poly(hydroxy urethane)s as well as the properties of the resulting poly(hydroxy urethane)s. Secondly, the design of waterborne PHU-PolyBMA polymer-polymer hybrids was performed using a miniemulsion process. Both non-crosslinked and crosslinked formulations were developed and compared with respect to kinetics, particle morphology, film formation ability and film morphology. On the one hand, in the case of non-crosslinked hybrids, the ratio between the PHU and the acrylic phase was found to have a strong impact onto the film casting ability as well as the extent of phase segregation. On the other hand, the influence of grafting was analyzed and it was shown to be a potential solution towards the formation of more homogeneous films, exhibiting tunable mechanical properties.