Insensitive High Cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine (RDX) Nanostructured Explosives Derived from Solvent/Nonsolvent Method in a Bacterial Cellulose (BC) Gelatin Matrix

Abstract

Cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine (RDX) is an energetic material (EM) from the class of cyclic nitroamine explosive widely used in military applications because of its excellent integral properties. Using bacterial cellulose (BC) gelatin with a three-dimensional network as a matrix, N,N-dimethyllformamide (DMF) as the solvent of RDX, the RDX nanostructured explosives were prepared through the solvent/nonsolvent method. It was found that the solvent had a great impact on the crystallization of RDX in the solution and the RDX content in the nanostructured explosive. The RDX particles in the nanostructured explosives smoothly coated to the nanofibers of BC gelatin network at high RDX concentrations, and the granularity distributions of RDX in the nanostructured explosives were very uniform in the range of 30–50 nm. The average contents of the RDX in the nanostructured explosives are greater than 83 wt.% when the RDX concentrations of the soaked solutions are greater than 0.20 g/mL. The average content is approximately 91 wt.% when the RDX concentration is 0.30 g/mL. The decomposition temperatures of the RDX nanostructured explosives were found to decrease approximately to 20°C and their mechanical sensitivities decreased greatly compared to that of raw micro-size RDX. It opens a useful way to prepare nanostructured explosives with high energy and low mechanical sensitivity.