Effect of different modified clays on the thermal and physical properties of polypropylene-montmorillonite nanocomposites

This paper studies the isothermal and nonisothermal crystallization of maleic anhydride grafted polypropylene-montmorillonite nanocomposites, compared to that of the polypropylene matrix (PP), by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The nanocomposites were prepared by melt-intercalation. The DSC results show that the presence of modified montmorillonite (mMMT) clay results in a shift of the onset and peak temperatures towards higher values. This suggests that thicker lamellar crystals appear. Thermomechanical analysis (TMA) was used to monitor the changes in volume expansion of PP in the presence of mMMT sheets. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.