Electrochemical behaviour of copper/LDPE composites in the simulated uterine solution

Two metal/insulator composites, copper/low-density polyethylene (LDPE) microcomposites and copper/LDPE nanocomposites, were prepared in a uniform metal mass fraction. The corrosion characteristics of the two composites in the simulated uterine solution have been studied by cyclic voltammetry, potentiodynamic polarization measurement and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. Results obtained during this study show that there are obvious differences on the corrosive rates and mechanisms between the two materials. The nanocomposites have stable corrosive reaction, hardly passivation, low corrosion rate and high transformation ratio of copper to soluble cupric ions compared with microcomposites, which indicate that the nanocomposites are perfect to be the novel material for intrauterine device. The corrosion behaviour of the microcomposites was controlled by both the processes of the pervasion of Cu2+ and the transfer of the charge, while that of the nanocomposites was only controlled by the transfer of the charge. This paper also compared the corrosion behaviours of the composites and bulk copper in the simulated uterine solution, there were more insoluble subproducts in the corrosion process of bulk copper than the composites. Further, the electrochemical method in this study is proved to be useful to characterize the corrosion behaviour of high electrical resistivity materials.