SBIR Phase II: Tough polymer composite materials through iLAMB, or interlaminar modifications through master batching

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project is to help usher in a new age of material consumption. While metals have been used for hundreds of years, composites are fairly new but can withstand even more wear and tear than steel. This project is aimed to advance composites even further by making them last longer or shed more weight. This will enable engines to have better fuel efficiency, allow lighter prosthetics, or achieve dependable, durable composite automobile frames. MITO hopes to aid all of these industries with the introduction of competitive and proprietary resin modifying nanoaddtives that enhance durability and toughness, reduce weight, and can be integrated into common composite manufacturing processes, including infusion molds and pre-pregs. With these potentials, it is estimated that this project could capture roughly 5% of the worldwide additive market currently worth $3.8 billion dollars, positioning material science to solve the composite industry's biggest problems with nano-sized solutions. This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project will scale up hybrid nano-fillers based on graphene oxide (GO) and polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS) to kilogram quantities and produce nano-fillers that have reactive moieties that are exactly compatible and dispersible in various resins, which has never been attempted before. The Phase I project successfully met all the technical goals. MITO additives will be added to epoxy or vinyl ester or polyester matrices through a Master Batch process to enhance the interlaminar fracture toughness of composite by more than 70% at extremely low addition levels (~0.1 to 0.2% by weight) without any changes in current manufacturing processes. It is proposed to scale up the existing hybrid nano-fillers, develop novel hybrid nano-fillers with better compatibility with epoxy, vinyl ester and polyester resins by introducing matching reactive groups into the fillers and Master Batching so that interlaminar fracture toughness can be improved by more than 100%. Flexure, Impact and SENB fracture tests, and XRD as well as SEM characterization will be performed on the cured Master Batches and composites. Flexure, double cantilever beam fracture and tension tests will be performed on composite samples to optimize the nanofiller content and the Master Batching process. 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.