Development of a Rapid Decompression System for Nanocellular Foaming at 100 MPa

Publication date: Available online 22 March 2019Source: The Journal of Supercritical FluidsAuthor(s): Takumi Ono, Xueli Wu, Takeshi Furuya, Satoshi YodaAbstractA new foaming apparatus, which can depressurize the vessel that contains polymer + gas from 100 MPa to atmospheric pressure in 50 ms, was developed to generate a high degree of supersaturation. The influences of the saturation conditions and the molecular weight of the polymer were studied with the new rapid decompression system using the polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) - CO2 system as a model. It is found that the Sub-micron cellular structures could be produced by using the apparatus. The results confirm the effectiveness of the high degree of supersaturation achieved in decreasing the cell size and increasing the cell nucleation density of foams. Moreover, it was revealed that the cell size and the cell nucleation density do not always vary as expected as the saturation pressure is increased at the decompression rate and the saturation temperature conditions used in this work.Graphical Abstract
Source: The Journal of Supercritical Fluids - Category: Chemistry Source Type: research