Poly(meth)acrylate grafted EPDM via reverse atom transfer radical polymerization: A single pot process

•A one pot process has been developed to graft poly(meth) acrylates from EPDM.•This process offers an efficient route to prepare tailor-made polar modified EPDM.•This process leads to graft copolymer without much gelation.•Grafted EPDMs exhibited high surface energy and improved mechanical properties.

This investigation reports a one pot preparation of poly(meth)acrylate grafted EPDM via reverse ATRP and evaluation of their physical and mechanical properties. The graft copolymerization of 2-ethylhexyl acrylate and methyl methacrylate was carried out from EPDM using reverse ATRP in toluene at 90 °C using CuBr2 as catalyst in combination with PMDETA as ligand and AIBN as thermal initiator. The grafted EPDMs were separated from the reaction mixture, purified and then characterized by FT-IR, 1H NMR, DMA and TGA analyses. Surface energies and tensile properties were evaluated by Goniometer and UTM respectively. Acrylate grafted EPDMs showed better thermal stability, better tensile property, whereas methacrylate grafted EPDMs showed higher surface energy and better oil resistance property than the pristine EPDM. Surface morphologies of grafted EPDMs were analyzed by AFM and SEM analyses. This one pot grafting approach led to very high grafting percentage without undesirable homopolymerization and gelation.

Graphical abstractThis investigation reports an in situ approach of grafting of polar monomers on EPDM via reverse atom transfer radical polymerization (RATRP). It provides a single step synthetic route to prepare (meth)acrylate grafted EPDMs of high surface energy with improved mechanical properties.Figure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slide