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European Polymer Journal 44 (2008) 11651174

EUROPEAN POLYMER JOURNAL

www.elsevier.com/locate/europolj

Non-isothermal crystallization, melting behavior and polymorphism of polypropylene in b-nucleated polypropylene/recycled poly(ethylene terephthalate) blends
Youji Tao, Yongxing Pan, Zishou Zhang, Kancheng Mai *
Materials Science Institute, Key Laboratory for Polymeric Composites and Functional Materials of the Ministry of Education, Polymer Physics and Chemistry, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510275, China Received 6 August 2007; received in revised form 29 October 2007; accepted 15 January 2008 Available online 20 January 2008

Abstract b-Nucleated polypropylene (PP), non-compatibilized and compatibilized b-nucleated PP/recycled poly(ethylene terephthalate) (r-PET) blends were prepared on a twin-screw extruder. The compatibilizers were maleic anhydride grafted PP (PP-g-MA), glycidyl methacrylate grafted PP (PP-g-GMA), maleic anhydride grafted polyethylene-octene (POE-gMA) and polyethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA-g-MA) elastomers. Eects of r-PET content, compatibilizer type and content, pre-melting temperature and time on the non-isothermal crystallization and melting behavior, and polymorphism of PP in the blends were investigated by dierential scanning calorimeter (DSC). DSC results show that the crystallization temperature of PP crystallized predominantly in b-modication was higher than that of neat PP. In the non-compatibilized blend, PP matrix crystallized mainly in a-modication even if r-PET content was only 10 wt%. However, PP-g-MA compatibilization made PP matrix crystallize mainly in b-modication, but PP-g-GMA, POE-g-MA and EVA-g-MA did not improve the b-modication content distinctly. The a-crystal melting peak temperature of PP decreased with increasing pre-melting temperature, but r-PET content, compatibilizer type and content as well as pre-melting time had no obvious eect on the melting temperature of PP. The increase in PP-g-MA content, pre-melting temperature and time was benet for the formation of b-modication. It is suggested that the b-nucleating agent is encapsulated or dissolved in polar r-PET in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blend, addition of PP-g-MA to the non-compatibilized blend resulted in transferring b-nucleating agent from r-PET phase into PP phase, the increase in PP-g-MA content, melting temperature and time was benet for transferring b-nucleating agent from r-PET phase into PP phase. The non-isothermal crystallization kinetics of PP in the blends were evaluated by Mos method. 2008 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Keywords: Polypropylene; Recycled PET; b-Nucleating agent; b-Modication; Non-isothermal crystallization kinetics

Corresponding author. Tel./fax: +86 20 84115109. E-mail address: cesmkc@mail.sysu.edu.cn (K. Mai).

0014-3057/$ - see front matter 2008 Published by Elsevier Ltd. doi:10.1016/j.eurpolymj.2008.01.023

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1. Introduction Polypropylene (PP) has complex polymorphism with several crystalline modications, such as a-, b- and c-modication. The formation of dierent modications is dependent of the crystallization conditions [14]. Generally, a-modication is obtained by crystallization from polymer solution or melt. In the last decades, PP crystallized in the presence of nucleating agent has been widely investigated. Addition of b-nucleating agents is an ecient method for preparation of b-modication PP (b-PP) [510]. Compared to a-modication PP (aPP), b-PP has several advantages, especially high impact strength at room temperature and low-temperature. However, the yield strength and elastic modulus of b-PP are lower than those of a-PP [1113]. In order to improve the properties of bPP, b-PP blends with other polymers have been studied. Varga et al. [10,14] have summarized the factors in the formation of b-modication of PP in the blends of b-PP with other polymers. b-PP based polymer blends can be prepared without any diculty if the polymer additive is amorphous, e.g., elastomer [1517]. In the case of b-PP blends with semicrystalline polymer, b-PP is easily obtained if the polymer additive has no or negligible a-nucleating ability, such as low-density polyethylene (LDPE) [15,18,19]; semicrystalline polymer additive having a-nucleating ability dont suppress the formation of b-PP matrix if they remain in molten state during the crystallization process of the PP component [18,20]. PP matrix crystallized predominantly in a-modication in the presence of semicrystalline polymer with a-nucleating ability, such as poly(vinylidene-uoride) and polyamid-6 (PA6) [20,21], even though a b-nucleating agent was added to PP, however, it was found that the PP matrix crystallized predominantly in b-modication after addition of little amount of maleic anhydride grafted PP (PP-g-MA) to the b-nucleated PP/PA6 blend as a compatibilizer. Besides, Varga et al. [22] have also studied the eect of poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) ber on the crystallization of PP in the PET ber-reinforced b-PP composites. PET is a thermoplastic polyester widely used in synthetic bers, lms and beverage, food and other liquid containers [23]. Many PET products, such as packaging bottles and lms were used only once, high consumption of PET bottles in packaging industry may inevitably lead to large amounts of plastic wastes. From the view of environment pro-

tecting and resources conservation, recycling of PET wastes is of great importance and emergency. Blending the recycled PET bottle materials (rPET) with polyolens [2433], polyesters [34] and nylon [35] is an attractive recycling method, owing to the ease of fabrication, economy and superior mechanical properties of the blends. However, as far as we know, there was no report on the b-PP blend with r-PET. PET is an engineering plastic with high tensile strength and elastic modulus. Blending b-PP matrix with r-PET will increase the yield strength and elastic modulus of b-PP. Thus, the study on b-PP/r-PET blend will have theoretical and application values. However, PP and PET are incompatible resulting in poor mechanical properties of PP/PET blends. Therefore, many eorts were made on stabilizing the blend morphology with compatibilization method. Several compatibilizers were applied, the generally used were PP-g-MA [36,37] and glycidyl methacrylate grafted polypropylene (PP-g-GMA) [38,39], and the eectiveness were quite satisfactory. Besides, maleic anhydride grafted polyethylene-octene elastomer (POE-gMA) [40] and maleic anhydride grafted polyethylene-vinyl acetate elastomer (EVA-g-MA) [41] were also used. According to our previous study [42], r-PET had a-nucleating eect on the crystallization of PP. In order to increase the content of b-PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blend and examine the factors inuencing the formation of b-PP in the blend, non-compatibilized and compatibilized b-PP/r-PET blends were prepared by melt extrusion in this work. PP-gMA, PP-g-GMA, POE-g-MA and EVA-g-MA were used as compatibilizers. Eects of r-PET content, compatibilizer type and content, pre-melting temperature and time on the formation of b-PP, crystallization and melting behavior of PP in the blends were investigated using dierential scanning calorimetry (DSC). Non-isothermal Crystallization kinetics was analyzed using theoretical method proposed by Mo and co-workers.

2. Experiment 2.1. Materials Polypropylene (PP, EPS30R) is copolymer grade, produced by Dushanzi Petrochemical Co., MFI = 3.4 g/10 min (230 C, 2.16 kg). Recycled PET is waste bottle grade, which has an intrinsic viscosity

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of 0.68 g/dl according to the supplier. PP-g-MA, PP-g-GMA, POE-g-MA and EVA-g-MA are commercial products, supplied by Guangzhou Lushan Chemical Materials Co., Ltd., the grafted contents of MA and GMA are 1.0 and 1.1 wt%, respectively. Active nano-CaCO3 was obtained from Gavin Chemical Industrial Enterprise Co., Ltd. of Guangdong Province in China. Aliphatic dicarboxylic acid was supplied by Shanghai Hongsheng Industry Co., Ltd., its purity is 98%. All the materials were used as-received. 2.2. Specimen preparation Before specimen preparation, all the materials were adequately dried in a vacuum oven at appropriate temperatures. The b-nucleating agent was prepared from a certain aliphatic dicarboxylic acid and nano-CaCO3 (1/50 w/w) in our laboratory. The b-nucleating agent was forming during the extruding process. b-Nucleating agent (3 wt%) was added to PP to prepare b-nucleated PP on a twinscrew extruder at 180 C. Extrudates were cooled in a water bath and cut into pellets by a pelletizer. The b-nucleated polypropylene/r-PET blends were prepared from the b-nucleated PP pellet and rPET on a twin-screw extruder at 240 C with the screw rotation of 600 r/min and residue time of 40 s. In some cases, compatibilizer was added. In the two-component blends, the amount of r-PET was 10, 20 and 30 wt%. Three-component blends composed of various compositions. b-Nucleated PP/PP-g-MA blend, b-nucleated PP and r-PET were also extruded under the same conditions as the blends preparation.

2.3. Apparatus and characterization procedures Non-isothermal crystallization and melting behavior were carried on a TA DSC Q10 dierential scanning calorimeter (DSC), the temperature calibrated with indium. About 5 mg of sample was weighted very accurately. After pre-melting, the sample was cooled to 100 C at the cooling rate of 10 C/min for crystallization behavior investigation, and then subsequently reheated to 280 C at the heating rate of 10 C/min for melting behavior and polymorphism investigation. The non-isothermal crystallization and subsequent melting curves were recorded. All measurements were performed in nitrogen atmosphere, each sample was used only once to alleviate any eects resulted from thermal degradation after high temperature treatment. According to the former study [10,15], ba transformation occurred during the partial melting of the bphase if b-PP sample cooled down below 100 C, so the end temperature of cooling was set to 100 C. This controlled cooling temperature prevents ba transformation, so the polymorphic composition of the sample can be determined accurately from the melting curves. 3. Results and discussion 3.1. The eect of r-PET content Fig. 1 shows the DSC non-isothermal crystallization and subsequent melting thermographs of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends pre-melting at 280 C for 10 min. The DSC data are shown in Table 1. Because the topic focused on the crystallization,

Fig. 1. DSC crystallization (a) and melting (b) thermographs of neat PP and PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends with various contents of r-PET (10, 20 and 30 wt% represents r-PET content).

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Table 1 DSC results of crystallization and melting of neat PP and PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blendsa Sample Crystallization Tcon (C) PP b-Nucleated b-Nucleated b-Nucleated b-Nucleated 121.6 124.8 119.4 118.5 118.4 Tcp (C) 115.4 122.1 117.2 117.1 117.2 DHc (J/g) 85.6 80.7 84.5 86.1 93.8 Melting Tmp (C) b PP PP/r-PET 90/10 PP/r-PET 80/20 PP/r-PET 70/30 148.1 148.1 148.1 b 150.7 155.0 155.0 155.1 a 162.7 163.9 162.5 162.6 162.4 82.0 83.7 74.8 79.3 86.5 DHm (J/g)

a Tcon, temperature at the onset of crystallization; Tcp and Tmp, temperatures at crystallization and melting peaks; DHc and DHm, enthalpy of crystallization and melting. DHc and DHm were normalized by PP content.

melting and polymorphism of PP, only the DSC thermographs and related discussions of PP were given in this paper, these about r-PET were not mentioned. There was only one melting peak located at 162.7 C for PP without nucleating agent, which was the melting characteristic of a-modication of PP. As for b-nucleated PP and PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends, double and ternary melting peaks were observed (Fig. 1b). The double melting peaks of b-nucleated PP appeared around 164 and 150 C, attributing to the melting of a- and b-modication of PP, respectively. The intensity of melting peak for b-modication is higher than that for amodication, suggesting that PP crystallized predominately in b-modication by addition of our self-made b-nucleating agent. For the ternary melting peaks appeared around 148, 150 and 163 C, the former two were known as melting of original bmodication and recrystallized b-modication [43], the last one was ascribed to melting of a-modication. The b-modication melting peak intensity decreased sharply when b-nucleated PP blended with r-PET, and the intensity decreased further with increasing r-PET content, indicating that r-PET was

not benet for the formation of b-modication of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends during the non-isothermal crystallization process. This may be because of the a-nucleating ability of r-PET [42,44] and encapsulation or dissolution of the bnucleating agent in r-PET phase. Both the b-nucleated agent and r-PET are polar, so the b-nucleating agent dissolved easier in r-PET than in PP. Men yhard et al. [14] found similar results in b-nucleated PP/PA6 blends research. It can be seen from Table 1 that the crystallization peak temperature (Tcp) of bnucleated PP was 5 C higher than that of PP in bnucleated PP/r-PET blends (Fig. 1a), which can be understood from the polymorphic composition change, the former crystallized mainly in b-modication due to the b-nucleating eect, but the later mainly in a-modication. 3.2. The eect of compatibilizers The DSC crystallization and melting thermographs of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET 70/30 blend compatibilized with PP-g-MA, PP-g-GMA, POEg-MA or EVA-g-MA are shown in Fig. 2. The four

Fig. 2. DSC crystallization (a) and melting (b) thermographs of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET 70/30 blend compatibilized with dierent compatibilizers (compatibilizer content was 5 phr).

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compatibilizers have dierent eects on the polymorphic composition of PP in the blends, but little inuence on the melting temperature of PP. PP in the non-compatibilized blend crystallized predominately in a-modication, which was proved by the strong melting peak located at 163 C and weak melting peaks at 148 and 155 C (Fig. 2b). When the b-nucleated PP/r-PET blend was compatibilized with PP-g-MA, PP matrix crystallized mainly in bmodication, which was proved by the strong melting peak located at 150 C. The eect of PP-g-GMA compatibilization on the b-modication content was less compared to PP-g-MA, but the b-modication content still increased with addition of PP-gGMA, proved by slight increase in the intensity of low-temperature melting peaks of PP. However, POE-g-MA did not seem to inuence the b-modication content, and EVA-g-MA even reduced it, proved by the decrease in the intensity of low-temperature melting peaks of PP. The dierent eects of the four compatibilizers on the polymorphic composition are ascribed to their dierent abilities to partitioning the b-nucleating agent in PP and r-PET phase. Three factors are benet for PP-g-MA transferring the b-nucleating agent from r-PET phase to PP phase: rstly, the chemical reaction between maleic anhydride (MA) group and terminal groups (OH and COOH) of r-PET reduced the polarity of r-PET, making r-PET release the b-nucleating agent; secondly, the adhesion of PP and r-PET phase is enhanced by compatibilization; nally, PP-g-MA has polar functional group and the backbone of PP-g-MA is compatible with PP. Thus, addition of PP-g-MA increased the bmodication content sharply. Based on our previous study [42], the chemical reaction of PP-g-GMA with r-PET was weaker than that of PP-g-MA with

r-PET, besides, the polarity of PP-g-GMA was weaker than that of PP-g-MA, thus the eect of PP-g-GMA on the b-modication content of PP in the compatibilized blend was less compared to that of PP-g-MA. POE-g-MA did not inuence the polymorphic composition was due to its poor compatibility with PP [45]. EVA-g-MA is not compatible with PP due to its strong polarity [46], the b-nucleating agent may transfer from r-PET and PP phase to the strong polar EVA-g-MA phase, leaving little b-nucleating agent in PP matrix, thus the b-modication content of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blend decreased with addition of EVAg-MA. Because of the b-nucleating eect, Tcp of PP in PP-g-MA compatibilized blend was higher than that of PP in the non-compatibilized and the other three compatibilized blends (Fig. 2a). The eect of PP-g-MA content on the crystallization, melting behavior and polymorphism of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blend was also carried out. It can be observed from Fig. 3 that although PPg-MA content had no eect on the non-isothermal crystallization behavior (Fig. 3a), PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends compatibilized by dierent contents of PP-g-MA showed dierent melting behavior. The intensity of low-temperature melting peak in the blend compatibilized by PP-g-MA at 4 phr was higher than that at 2 phr (Fig. 3b), indicating formation of more b-modication at 4 phr PP-gMA, suggesting that high PP-g-MA content can transfer more b-nucleating agent from r-PET phase into PP phase. The result supports the hypothesis that the b-nucleating agent is encapsulated or dissolved in r-PET phase. Although addition of PP-g-MA increased the bmodication content of PP in b-nucleated PP/rPET blend, it reduced the b-modication content

Fig. 3. DSC crystallization (a) and melting (b) thermographs of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET 80/20 blend compatibilized with 2 and 4 phr PP-g-MA.

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Fig. 4. DSC melting thermograph of b-nucleated PP/PP-g-MA 95/5 blend.

when adding to b-nucleated PP. The DSC melting thermograph of b-nucleated PP/PP-g-MA 95/5 blend is shown in Fig. 4. It can be observed that the intensity of melting peak for b-modication decreased while the intensity of melting peak for a-modication increased as addition of 5 wt% PPg-MA into b-nucleated PP, because PP-g-MA with polar functional group captured b-nucleating agent from PP, reducing the nucleator content in PP. 3.3. The eect of pre-melting temperature The transfer of b-nucleating agent from r-PET to PP phase by PP-g-MA was related to some factors which inuenced the polymorphic composition of PP as a result. Thus, the eects of pre-melting temperature and pre-melting time were examined. The DSC crystallization and melting thermographs of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5

blend pre-melting at various temperatures for 10 min are shown in Fig. 5. Only one melting peak was observed due to melting of a-crystal when the blend pre-melting at 220 and 240 C, a low-temperature melting peak occurred due to melting of bcrystal if the blend melted at 260 C, the b-crystal melting peak predominated when the pre-melting temperature was 280 C (Fig. 5b). In a word, the b-crystal melting peak intensity enhanced with the increasing pre-melting temperature. b-Nucleating agent cant be released from r-PET at 220 C and 240 C because r-PET is in solid state, thus the PP matrix crystallized predominantly in a-form under the a-nucleating ability of crystallized r-PET. rPET melted at 260 and 280 C, and the melt viscosity of r-PET at 280 C was lower than that at 260 C based on Arrhenius equation [47], so the transfer of b-nucleating agent from r-PET to PP was easier at 280 C, resulting in the formation of high content of b-modication. Tcp of PP decreased with increasing pre-melting temperature in b-nucleated PP/rPET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5 blend (Fig. 5a), which may be for two reasons. Firstly, PP may thermally degrade at high pre-melting temperature, forming branched PP and low-molecular weight polymers; the other one, macromolecular chains of PP may entangle with r-PET chains at high pre-melting temperature. The two cases are both not benet for the crystallization of PP, so Tcp decreased with increasing pre-melting temperature. The a-crystal melting peak temperature of PP also decreased with increasing pre-melting temperature. The inuence of pre-melting temperature on the non-isothermal crystallization, melting behavior and polymorphism of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-

Fig. 5. DSC crystallization (a) and melting (b) thermographs of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5 blend pre-melting at various temperatures for 10 min.

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PET/PP-g-MA 80/20/4 blend was similar to that of b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5 blend. 3.4. The eect of pre-melting time

revealed that the b-crystal melting peaks were still small even though the pre-melting time was prolonged to 15 min. 3.5. Non-isothermal crystallization kinetics analysis

Fig. 6 shows the DSC melting thermographs of PP in PP-g-MA compatibilized b-nucleated PP/rPET blends with dierent r-PET contents. The blends were pre-melting for dierent time at 280 C before non-isothermal crystallization. The melting thermographs were recorded during the reheated process after non-isothermal crystallization. There was no dierence in the two melting thermographs of b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 80/20/4 blend pre-melting for 5 and 10 min (Fig. 6a), indicating the b-nucleating agent transfer equilibrium between r-PET and PP phase achieved within 5 min at 280 C. However, for b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5 blend, 10 min premelting led to stronger b-crystal melting peak compared to 5 min pre-melting, and the melting thermographs were almost the same if the blend pre-melted for 10 and 15 min (Fig. 6b), indicating the transfer equilibrium achieved between 5 and 10 min. From the above results, we concluded that the time needed for the achievement of the b-nucleating agent transfer equilibrium between r-PET and PP phase was with aspect to r-PET content. The result also supports the hypothesis of encapsulation or dissolution of the b-nucleating agent in polar r-PET phase. The pre-melting time had no distinct eect on the melting temperature of PP in the two blends. The pre-melting time eects on the polymorphic composition of PP in 5 phr PP-g-GMA, POE-gMA or EVA-g-MA compatibilized b-nucleated PP/r-PET 70/30 blends were also studied, results

The most commonly used isothermal crystallization kinetic equation is the well-known Avrami equation. The application of this model to non-isothermal conditions was solved by Ozawa and Mo. There are several other approximations which deal with nonisothermal crystallization kinetics. A review paper of Silvestre et al. [48] discussed the most important non-isothermal crystallization kinetic models. The double logarithmic form of Avrami equation is [49]: log ln1 X T log Z t n log t 1

where X(T) is the relative crystallinity at the crystallization time t; Zt and n are crystallization kinetic constant and Avrami exponent, respectively, and both are related to the rate and mechanism of crystallization. Ozawa derived an equation which double logarithmic form is [50]: log ln1 X T log KT m log R 2

where R is the cooling rate, K(T) is a function related to the overall crystallization rate; m is the Ozawa index, which is somewhat similar to the Avrami exponent and depends on the type of nucleation and growth dimensions. Mo and co-workers [51] proposed a dierent equation by combining the Avrami and Ozawa equations, giving rise to the relationship between cooling rate R and crystallization time t at a given relative crystallinity:

Fig. 6. DSC melting thermographs of PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 80/20/4 (a) and b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5 (b) blends pre-melting for dierent time at 280 C.

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log Z t n log t log KT m log R log R log F T a log t

3 4

Table 2 Non-isothermal crystallization kinetic parameters of PP in bnucleated PP and b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends compatibilized with PP-g-MA X(T) (%) b-Nucleated PP 10 30 50 70 90 F(T) 7.98 9.59 10.83 12.10 14.37 a 1.30 1.33 1.35 1.35 1.35 1.04 1.11 1.13 1.15 1.16 1.12 1.19 1.21 1.22 1.23

where the kinetic parameter, F(T) = [K(T)/Zt]1/m. F(T) has a denite physical and practical meaning, the smaller the value of F(T) is, the higher the crystallization rate becomes. The Mo exponent a is the ration of the Avrami exponent n to the Ozawa exponent m, that is, a = n/m. After tting our experimental results to Ozawa equation and Mos method, we found only Mos method can satisfactorily describe the non-isothermal crystallization behavior of the researched blends. At a given relative crystallinity, plots of log R against log t of b-nucleated PP and PP in bnucleated PP/r-PET blends compatibilized by PPg-MA are given in Fig. 7. Obviously, the plots are straight lines, implying agreement of the experimental results with Mos theoretical prediction. The values of F(T) and a can be obtained from the slopes and intercepts of the straight lines, respectively, tabulated in Table 2. For each specimen, F(t) increased systematically with increasing the relative degree of crystallinity and the values of a increased slightly.

b-Nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 80/20/4 10 9.70 30 11.41 50 12.46 70 13.63 90 15.57 b-Nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5 10 9.74 30 11.59 50 12.72 70 13.94 90 16.00

Besides, at the same X(T), the values of F(T) for these specimen ranked as: b-nucleated PP/r-PET/

Fig. 7. Plots of log R versus log t for b-nucleated PP (a) and PP in b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-g-MA 80/20/4 blend (b) and b-nucleated PP/ r-PET/PP-g-MA 70/30/5 blend (c).

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PP-g-MA 70/30/5 blend > b-nucleated PP/r-PET/ PP-g-MA 80/20/4 blend > b-nucleated PP. This means that to reach the same X(T), the crystallization time needed of b-nucleated PP/r-PET/PP-gMA 70/30/5 is the longest and that of b-nucleated PP is the shortest, indicating that r-PET was not benet for the formation of b-modication for PP. These results were in agreement with the crystallization behavior and polymorphic composition discussed above. 4. Conclusions The crystallization, melting behavior and polymorphic composition of PP in non-compatibilized and compatibilized b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends were related to r-PET content, compatibilizer type and content, pre-melting temperature and time. PP crystallized predominantly in b-modication has higher crystallization temperature compared to that of PP without b-nucleating agent. r-PET suppressed the formation of b-modication in b-nucleated PP/ r-PET blend, but the PP matrix crystallized predominantly in b-modication with addition of PP-g-MA to the b-nucleated PP/r-PET blend. Among the compatibilization of PP-g-MA, PP-g-GMA, POEg-MA and EVA-g-MA, PP-g-MA compatibilization was the most benet for the formation of b-PP in bnucleated PP/r-PET blend. The increase in PP-gMA content, pre-melting temperature and time was benet for the formation of b-modication, which supports the hypothesis of encapsulation or dissolution of the b-nucleating agent in polar rPET phase. The non-isothermal crystallization process of b-nucleated PP and PP in PP-g-MA compatibilized b-nucleated PP/r-PET blends can be successfully described by Mos method. Acknowledgements The project was supported by Key Program of Guangdong Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 06104925) and Fundamental Research Foundation of Guangzhou. References
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