A review on the free radical grafting of vinyl monomers onto polyethylene and polypropylene by reactive extrusion

Polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) have been widely used in films, pipes, plates, fibers, and electronic devices, etc. due to a good balance between mechanical properties, processability and cost. They are apolar and chemically relatively inert. Sometimes these characteristics may restrain their application. A solution to making them polar and/or chemically reactive is to graft polar and/or functional groups onto their backbones. This can be done by free radical chemistry via a reactive extrusion process which is continuous, solventless and of short residence time (

Automated summary

Polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) are widely used in various industries due to their balanced mechanical properties, processability, and cost-effectiveness. However, their non-polar and chemically inert nature can sometimes limit their applications. To overcome this, polar and/or functional groups can be grafted onto their backbones using free radical chemistry and reactive extrusion process, which is continuous, solventless, and has a short residence time.