Authors
Abstract
To solve different problems related to the radiation stability of polymeric articles and purposeful radiation-induced modifications of polymeric materials, the effect of low dose of gamma irradiation on some mechanical properties, at room temperature and in the presence of oxygen, on blends of high density polyethylene (HDPE) and high impact polystyrene (HIPS) has been studied.
Thermal – mechanical mixing was used to prepare binary polymeric blends from (HDPE / HIPS) with different compositional ratios, i.e. (100/0, 90/10, 80/20) using single screw extruder. The exposure of these blends to dose of Cs-137 gamma radiation at 0.2 kGy improves the mechanical properties. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) has been used to investigate the effect of gamma irradiation on the surface morphology of the polymer material. It is noticed that after the radiation treatment; tensile strength, modulus of elasticity and hardness of used (HDPE/HIPS) at all blends ratio have been increased due to partial cross linking.
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