DIBUTYLTIN DILAURATE-CATALYZED DIISOCYANATE COUPLING- GRAFTING OF POLY(ETHYLENE GLYCOL) ONTO NANO-SI

Grafting polymer glycols onto nano-silica surface through one-step procedure was investigated. The major characteristic of this procedure is that all the materials and reagents (silica, PEG, TDI, DBTDL, solvent) required for grafting were added simultaneously into the reaction vessel. TDI and DBTDL were used as coupling agent and catalyst, respectively.The products were characterized by FTIR, TGA, elemental analyses and TEM, giving evidence for successful grafting of PEG. Possible mechanism of this grafting was studied and two grafting processes were proposed. The process through which the grafting proceeds depends on the reaction temperature. Effect of molecular weight of PEG on grafting was also investigated.