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Study of degradation of polystyrene, using infrared spectrophotometry

1951; US government; Volume: 47; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.6028/jres.047.016

2376-5305

B Achhammer, M.J. Reiney, Frank W. Reinhart,

Analytical Chemistry and Chromatography

Sin ce p olystyrene is a widely used plastic a nd styrene is an in tegral part of t he m ost wid ely used sy nthetic r ubber (GR-S) , it appears necessary to k now somethi ng of the process of degrada t ion of polystyrene t o a ssist in in terpreting t he d egradation of these materi als in service.P olystyrene films were exposed to h eat at 100° C in a for ced-draft air oven a nd to ultraviolet ra di a nt e nergy at 60° C in air.Chemical st r uctural changes in t he polymer a s a resul t of t hese t reatments were a nalyzed b y st udy of t he infrared spectra between 2 a nd 16 microns , obtained wit h a Ba ird recording infra red spectrop ho tomete r.U lt rav iolet expos ure fo], 200 hours resulted in a bsorpt ions a t 2.9 and 5.8 microns, which a re attributed to hydroxyl a nd carbonyl groups, respectively.H eati ng of t he film for 270 hours at 100° C p rodu ced no signifi can t change in the infra red spectrum.P ro longed heating at.125° C resul te d in t he dest r uction of t he films by £i ow.The literature and t heory o n t he d egrada t io n of p olys tyrene a re discussed.Several me cha nis ms are postu lated to a ccou nt for the p rod uction of hydroxyl a nd carbonyl p rodu cts in t he p oly mer .