Developing surfmer structure-property relationships for high internal phase emulsion foams

随着对清洁水的需求以及对提高生活质量的产品的需求的增长，支持化学产品开发和生产的行业继续向环境排放污染物和污染物。需要技术来消除水中的这些化学物质，使其能够以高效和成本效益高的方式安全地日常使用。高内相乳液聚合物泡沫(PHIPE)是一种从水中提取化学物质并将其捕获到毛孔中的材料，从而产生更清洁、更安全的水。然而，目前制造PHIPE的方法使用的是在使用前必须去除的化学品，导致材料成本增加，并担心这些材料中的残留污染物可能会进一步污染水。该项目满足了国家对创建有效和安全的PHIPE的需求，这些PHIPE在保持低制造成本的同时不会对环境构成风险。此外，研究团队成员将直接与社区利益相关者合作，了解水处理和可用的处理技术的知识和看法，以增加社区对PHIPE技术的采用和所有权。高内相乳液聚合物泡沫(PHIPE)是一种水处理技术，需要解决社区水处理基础设施的紧迫问题。PHIPE是一种具有高内表面积的吸附剂，它来源于初始的溶剂/单体乳液和稳定溶剂/单体界面的表面活性剂。尽管PHIPE的作用依赖于表面活性剂，但在了解表面活性剂结构对PHIPE性能的影响或减少聚合后去除它的必要性方面做的工作很少。为了满足这一需求，本项目将确定反应性表面活性剂(冲浪剂)的结构-性质关系，以展示表面活性剂结构对PHIPE的多孔性能和本体性质的影响。表面活性剂的合成和设计将稳定单体/溶剂界面，并参与本体聚合，从而产生界面活性和多孔结构可调的PHIPE，这些表面活性和孔形态不会被淋溶，并且符合绿色化学的原则。合成后，表面活性剂结构将与界面动力学(例如，界面张力、扩散和吸附)、泡沫性能(例如，比表面积和孔形态)以及聚合(例如，表面活性剂的加入、转化率和模数)相关联。这项工作还将纳入研究，以制定有效的战略，与非科学家就其社区中的水质问题、可用的技术和现有的基础设施进行沟通，目标是增加科学知识。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

As the demand for clean water grows along with demand for products that improve quality of life, industries that support the development and production of chemical products continue to release pollutants and contaminants into the environment. Technology is needed to remove these chemicals from water to render it safe for daily use in an efficient and cost-effective manner. High internal phase emulsion polymer foams (pHIPE) are materials that pull chemicals from the water and trap them in pores, resulting in cleaner, safer water. However, current methods for manufacturing pHIPE use chemicals that must be removed prior to use, resulting in an increase in material cost and a concern that residual contaminants in these materials may further pollute the water. This project addresses the national need for creating effective and safe pHIPE that pose no environmental risk while retaining a low manufacturing cost. In addition, the research team members will work directly with community stakeholders to understand knowledge and perception of water treatment and available treatment technologies to increase community adoption and ownership of the pHIPE technology.High internal phase emulsion polymer foams (pHIPEs) are a form of water treatment technology needed to address urgent issues with community water treatment infrastructure. pHIPEs are adsorbents with a high internal surface area that originates from the initial solvent/monomer emulsion and the surfactant that stabilizes the solvent/monomer interface. Despite the reliance of pHIPE function on surfactants, little work has been done to understand the impact of surfactant structure on pHIPE performance or reduce the need to remove it post-polymerization. To meet this need, this project will determine structure-property relationships for reactive surfactants (surfmers) that demonstrate the impact of surfactant structure on the porous performance and bulk properties of pHIPEs. Surfmers will be synthesized and designed to stabilize the monomer/solvent interface and to participate in bulk polymerization, resulting in pHIPEs with tunable interfacial activity and porous morphology that do not leach and that conform to the principles of green chemistry. After synthesis, surfmer structure will be correlated to interfacial dynamics (e.g., interfacial tension, diffusion, and adsorption), foam performance (e.g., specific surface area and pore morphology), and polymerization (e.g, surfmer incorporation, conversion, and modulus). This work will also incorporate research to develop effective strategies for communicating with non-scientists about water quality issues, available technologies, and existing infrastructure in their community, with the goal of increasing scientific literacy.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.