Synthesis and characterization of novel organic magnesium salt flame retardant

Magnesium hydroxide (MH), being an environment-friendly flame retardant, are usually added into polymers to obtain satisfying flame retardancy in high loading. Bad compatibility and high loading both cause poor mechanical properties of polymer composites. In this paper, organic groups were introduced into the molecular structure of MH, which can take part in the synthetic reaction of polymer and then be grafted on long chains of polymer. It is promising that the integrated performance of flame retardancy and good mechanic properties can be achieved at the same time. Pure terephthalic acid (PTA) was chosen to react with MH in organic solvent to obtain an organic magnesium salt (OMS) containing organic groups. The obtained OMS was characterized in terms of morphology, particle size, crystal structure, and thermal stability by field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), X-ray power diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Moreover, the molecular structure of OMS was verified by mass spectrometry (MS).