A facile approach of improving the inhibition of arylfulleropyrrolidine on the thermal decomposition of nitrocellulose by enhancing the thermal interaction

Abstract

A series of aryl[70]fulleropyrrolidine (5a–5b’) were successfully designed and synthesized using Prato reaction. The results of non-isothermal thermal analysis showed that 5a–5b’ can increase the critical explosion temperature of nitrocellulose by 0.8–1.8 K. The results of isothermal experiments proved that 5a–5b’ can prolong the discoloration time of methyl violet test paper of nitrocellulose at 407.65 K and the safe storage life of nitrocellulose at 323.15 K by 87 min and 34.46 years, respectively. The adiabatic accelerated calorimetry analysis showed that 5a–5b’ can reduce the initial autocatalytic decomposition reaction of nitrocellulose. The thermal stability of 5a–5b’ to nitrocellulose was proved to mainly depends on the nitrogen oxide radical scavenging ability of fullerene. Obviously, a small amount of aryl[70]fulleropyrrolidine mixed with aryl[60]fulleropyrrolidine can significantly improve the inhibition of aryl[60]fulleropyrrolidine on the thermal decomposition of nitrocellulose. Subsequently, the feasibility of low-cost and large-scale preparation of arylfulleropyrrolidine stabilizer using fullerene soot as precursor was explored.