TY - CONF A1 - Ghasem Zadeh Khorasani, Media A1 - Silbernagl, Dorothee A1 - Sturm, Heinz T1 - Mechanical and chemical alteration of polymer matrix induced by nanoparticles in epoxy-boehmite nanocomposites N2 - Inorganic nanoparticles are used to improve the performance of epoxy as the matrix phase in fiber-reinforced composites used for aerospace applications. The effectiveness of nanofillers on property enhancement of thermosetting polymers depends on many factors including the interaction between the functional groups of nanofillers and the polymer reactants. In the current work, we study the effect of boehmite nanoparticles (BNPs) on properties of anhydride-cured bisphenol-A-diglycidyl ether (DGEBA). Dynamic mechanical thermal analysis (DMTA) and a high-resolution force measurement approach called intermodulation atomic force microscopy (ImAFM) were carried out to investigate the thermomechanical and nanomechanical properties of this material, respectively. It was found that BNPs lead to decrease of glass transition temperature (Tg) and crosslink density of the polymer network meanwhile significantly enhancing the Young’s modulus. Besides formation of a soft interphase near the particles, significant changes in local stiffness of polymer matrix far from the interphase was observed with ImAFM. Thus, boehmite induces long-range chemical alteration on the matrix. This effect has a higher impact on overall composite properties compared to the formation of interphase which is only a short-range effect. The local chemical evaluations on the soft interphase using an infrared-AFM method (NanoIR) revealed the accumulation of anhydride hardener near the boehmite interface. Based on these observations the effect of boehmite on the curing of epoxy is hypothesized to be governed by the strong interaction between boehmite and the anhydride. This interaction causes changes the ratio of reactants in the epoxy mixture and hence alteration of curing pathway and the network architecture. In future studies we examine this hypothesis by measuring the thermomechanical properties of cured epoxies in which the epoxy-hardener ratio is systematically altered and further comparing to those properties of nanocomposites shown in the current study. T2 - HYMA 6th International Conference on Multifunctional, Hybrid and Nanomaterials CY - Sitges, Spain DA - 11.03.2019 KW - Nanomechanics KW - Polymer nanocomposites KW - Boehmite KW - AFM KW - Epoxy PY - 2019 AN - OPUS4-50692 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -