Monomer-in-water miniemulsions by membrane emulsification

Abstract

Commercial products of miniemulsion polymerization are still scarce, and one of the major challenges for industrial implementation is the miniemulsification step. The aim of this work is to introduce the membrane emulsification technology as a robust and low energy alternative. The proposed system allows the production of monomer-in-water miniemulsions with droplet sizes of around 300nm and moderate distributions for up to 30wt% of methyl methacrylate phase in a quick and simple way. Thus, the membrane emulsification technology can become an excellent approach for the production of miniemulsions for polymerization. The emulsifying power of four pumps, used in the membrane emulsification setups, was also studied and it was shown that in most cases, with the single use of the pumps, emulsions with broad distributions were produced.