The structure of interfacial regions in polymer nanocomposites

The paper analyzes the dependence of characteristics of the interface areas between the filler and the metal-polymer nanocomposite on structural parameters of the metal-polymer nanocomposite obtained by cross-linking two polymers (epoxy resin ED-20 and butadiene styrene rubber - BSR) and the filler, i.e. copper nanoparticles. To calculate the volume fraction of the interphase region, φмф, we used the previously established expressions for the fractal dimension of the surface of the filler particles, dH, and the diameter of the filler particle aggregates, Dag. The polymer under study is considered as a natural nanocomposite using cluster models to describe the peculiarities of its amorphous state structure. According to this model, a mesh polymer consists of two components - a loosely packed matrix and nanoclusters, the latter plays the role of a nano-filler, and a loosely packed matrix which plays the role of a natural nanocomposite matrix. On the basis of the fractal estimates of the surface of nanoclusters, the dependence of the volume fraction of the loosely packed matrix on the composite temperature has been found. It has been shown that the dimensional effect of nanoclusters is identical to the corresponding effect of the dispersed nano-filler in artificial polymeric nanocomposites, namely, the reduction of the number of statistical segments in one cluster and the radius of the clusters increases the degree of amplification (modulus of elasticity) of the natural nanocomposite. In addition, for the mesh polymer under consideration, there are no interphase regions structurally different from the loosely packed matrix, since the calculations of the relative volume fractions of the interphase regions and the loosely packed matrix, respectively, show a good convergence within a given error of the initial data.