In this work, a simple but effective approach was proposed for preparing biodegradable plastic foams with a high content of castor oil. First of all, castor oil reacted with maleic anhydride to produce maleated castor oil (MACO) without the aid of any catalyst. Then plastic foams were synthesized through free radical initiated copolymerization between MACO and diluent monomer styrene. With changes in MACO/St ratio and species of curing initiator, mechanical properties of MACO foams can be easily adjusted. In this way, biofoams with comparable compressive stress at 25% strain as commercial polyurethane (PU) foams were prepared, while the content of castor oil can be as high as 61 wt %. The soil burial tests further proved that the castor oil based foams kept the biodegradability of renewable resources despite the fact that some petrol-based components were introduced.
In this work, plastic foams were prepared from plant oil resins based on soybean oil and
castor oil. Firstly, epoxidized soybean oil (ESO) reacted with acrylic acid using N, N-dimethyl benzyl
amine as the catalyst, and castor oil was modified with maleic anhydride, respectively. Acid number
was used to monitor the reaction process, and structures of the resultant acrylated epoxidized soybean
oil (AESO) and maleate castor oil (MACO) were proved by Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR)
measurements. It was found that the catalyst is quite effective in synthesizing AESO. Then, plastic
foams based on AESO and MACO were synthesized through free radical initiated copolymerization
with diluent monomers including styrene and methyl methacrylate. Mechanical properties,
reinforcing effect of sisal fiber and biodegradable feature of the foams were characterized, showing
the suitability of the bio-foams for acting as packaging materials.
A series of reduced graphene oxide/cobalt oxide composites (Co3O4/rGO)were fabricated via a chemical precipitation approach and subsequent calcination in Ar atmosphere. Experimental results show that Co3O4/rGO composite with 86 wt% of Co3O4 loading exhibits the optimum specific capacitance of 240 F g-1 in 6.0 M KOH electrolyte at the current density of 0.8 A g-1, excellent quick charge-discharge performance and outstanding cyclic stability with 2.3% of its specific capacitance increase after 2400 cycles at the current density of 8 A g-1 in GCD test, exhibiting significant potential of Co3O4 /rGO composite in the application of supercapacitors.
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