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Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability

Improving the processability of ultrahigh molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) and understanding the effect of the polymeric chain mobility has long been a challenging task. Herein, we show that UHMWPE without any processing aids can be processed at a lower temperature of 180 °C compared to conven...

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Autores principales: Chen, Xiaochuan, Wang, Xiaotong, Feng, Yanhong, Qu, Jinping, Yu, Dingshan, Cao, Changlin, Chen, Xudong
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8271948/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34209419
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/polym13132192
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author Chen, Xiaochuan
Wang, Xiaotong
Feng, Yanhong
Qu, Jinping
Yu, Dingshan
Cao, Changlin
Chen, Xudong
author_facet Chen, Xiaochuan
Wang, Xiaotong
Feng, Yanhong
Qu, Jinping
Yu, Dingshan
Cao, Changlin
Chen, Xudong
author_sort Chen, Xiaochuan
collection PubMed
description Improving the processability of ultrahigh molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) and understanding the effect of the polymeric chain mobility has long been a challenging task. Herein, we show that UHMWPE without any processing aids can be processed at a lower temperature of 180 °C compared to conventional processing temperatures (~250 °C) under a continuous elongational flow (CEF) by using an eccentric rotor extruder (ERE). By probing the effect of the residence time of UHMWPE samples under a CEF on the morphology, rheological behavior and molecular orientation, we find that the long polymer chains of UHMWPE are apt to orientate under a consecutive volume elongational deformation, thereby leading to a higher residual stress for the extruded sample. Meanwhile, the residence time of samples can regulate the polymeric chain mobility, giving rise to the simultaneous decrease of the melting defects and residual stress as well as Hermans orientation function with increasing residence time from 0 to 60 s. This also engenders the enhanced diffusion of UHMWPE segments, resulting in a defect-free morphology and higher entanglement with lower crystallinity but without causing obvious thermal oxidative degradation of UHMWPE. This interesting result could originate from the fast chain entanglement and particle welding enabled by a desirably short residence time, which could be explained by the empirical, entropy-driven melting explosion mechanism.
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spelling pubmed-82719482021-07-11 Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability Chen, Xiaochuan Wang, Xiaotong Feng, Yanhong Qu, Jinping Yu, Dingshan Cao, Changlin Chen, Xudong Polymers (Basel) Article Improving the processability of ultrahigh molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) and understanding the effect of the polymeric chain mobility has long been a challenging task. Herein, we show that UHMWPE without any processing aids can be processed at a lower temperature of 180 °C compared to conventional processing temperatures (~250 °C) under a continuous elongational flow (CEF) by using an eccentric rotor extruder (ERE). By probing the effect of the residence time of UHMWPE samples under a CEF on the morphology, rheological behavior and molecular orientation, we find that the long polymer chains of UHMWPE are apt to orientate under a consecutive volume elongational deformation, thereby leading to a higher residual stress for the extruded sample. Meanwhile, the residence time of samples can regulate the polymeric chain mobility, giving rise to the simultaneous decrease of the melting defects and residual stress as well as Hermans orientation function with increasing residence time from 0 to 60 s. This also engenders the enhanced diffusion of UHMWPE segments, resulting in a defect-free morphology and higher entanglement with lower crystallinity but without causing obvious thermal oxidative degradation of UHMWPE. This interesting result could originate from the fast chain entanglement and particle welding enabled by a desirably short residence time, which could be explained by the empirical, entropy-driven melting explosion mechanism. MDPI 2021-06-30 /pmc/articles/PMC8271948/ /pubmed/34209419 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/polym13132192 Text en © 2021 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Chen, Xiaochuan
Wang, Xiaotong
Feng, Yanhong
Qu, Jinping
Yu, Dingshan
Cao, Changlin
Chen, Xudong
Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability
title Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability
title_full Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability
title_fullStr Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability
title_full_unstemmed Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability
title_short Enhancing Chain Mobility of Ultrahigh Molecular Weight Polyethylene by Regulating Residence Time under a Consecutive Elongational Flow for Improved Processability
title_sort enhancing chain mobility of ultrahigh molecular weight polyethylene by regulating residence time under a consecutive elongational flow for improved processability
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8271948/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34209419
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/polym13132192
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