General-Purpose Coarse-Grained Toughened Thermoset Model for 44DDS/DGEBA/PES

The objective of this work is to predict the morphology and material properties of crosslinking polymers used in aerospace applications. We extend the open-source dybond plugin for HOOMD-Blue to implement a new coarse-grained model of reacting epoxy thermosets and use the 44DDS/DGEBA/PES system as a...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Michael M. Henry, Stephen Thomas, Mone’t Alberts, Carla E. Estridge, Brittan Farmer, Olivia McNair, Eric Jankowski
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2020-10-01
Series:Polymers
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4360/12/11/2547
Description
Summary:The objective of this work is to predict the morphology and material properties of crosslinking polymers used in aerospace applications. We extend the open-source dybond plugin for HOOMD-Blue to implement a new coarse-grained model of reacting epoxy thermosets and use the 44DDS/DGEBA/PES system as a case study for calibration and validation. We parameterize the coarse-grained model from atomistic solubility data, calibrate reaction dynamics against experiments, and check for size-dependent artifacts. We validate model predictions by comparing glass transition temperatures measurements at arbitrary degree of cure, gel-points, and morphology predictions against experiments. We demonstrate for the first time in molecular simulations the cure-path dependence of toughened thermoset morphologies.
ISSN:2073-4360