Cerium Salts: An Efficient Curing Catalyst for Benzoxazine Based Coatings.

The effect of three different cerium salts (Ce(NO3)3.6H2O, CeCl3.7H2O and Ce(OOCCH3)3.5H2O) on the ring-opening polymerization (ROP) of a model diamine-based benzoxazine (4EP-pPDA) was investigated. With the incorporation of the cerium salts, the curing temperature of 4EP-pPDA is reduced substantially, and the glass transition temperatures of the resulting networks are increased significantly. The three cerium salts exhibit different catalytic activities, which were analyzed by FT-IR, NMR, and energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX). Ce(NO3)3.6H2O was found to exhibit the best catalytic effect, which seems to be related to its better dispersibility within 4EP-pPDA benzoxazine precursors.

Improvement of Mechanical and Dielectric Properties of Epoxy Resin Using CNTs/ZnO Nanocomposite.

In this study, carbon nanotubes (CNTs)/ZnO composites had been prepared using the sol-gel method and then incorporated into an epoxy resin for reinforcement of mechanical and electrical properties. Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD) Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FE-SEM) analyses show that the ZnO nanoparticles deposited on CNTs were crystallized in a hexagonal wurtzite structure. Average particle size of ZnO deposited on the CNT was about 8 nm. The mechanical and dielectric properties of epoxy containing CNTs/ZnO were investigated in comparison to epoxy resin and epoxy resin containing only CNT or ZnO nanoparticles. The results indicated that tensile strength and elongation at break of the nanocomposite were substantially improved with the presence of CNTs/ZnO at the equal volume. The DSC analysis associate with the dielectric results shows that the behavior of epoxy/CNTs/ZnO is identical to epoxy/ZnO composite, and the CNTs is essential to the distributed arrangement of ZnO in the epoxy resin.

Facile preparation of a novel high performance benzoxazine-CNT based nano-hybrid network exhibiting outstanding thermo-mechanical properties.

Untreated multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) have been dispersed in two benzoxazine precursors following an easy procedure. The strong intrinsic interactions of CNTs with a selected precursor give rise to the formation of a reinforced network with outstanding thermo-mechanical properties.