New Insights into Acrylic Polymer Precipitation by Supercritical Fluids

Abstract

Nanosystems based on polymers have attracted much attention due to the almost infinite diversity. In the past decades, the application of supercritical fluids for polymeric particle precipitation has been developed as an alternative to conventional processes. Here, precipitation of an acrylic copolymer was attempted by the rapid expansion of supercritical solutions (RESS) and successful by supercritical antisolvent (SAS) processes. In addition, the nanoparticles were characterized with different techniques. The polymer concentration, pressure, temperature, liquid solution flow rate and nozzle diameter effects were also evaluated with regard to particle size and the particle size distribution of this polymer.