Reactions of boehmite with carboxylic acids - A simple synthetic route to hybrid nanofillers

The paper presents the results of research aimed at the determination of the structure of products formed as a result of the modification of boehmite (Fig. 1) with carboxylic acids (Table 1) and gives some examples of possible applications of the products as nanofillers (Table 2-3). It has been shown that, in the systems studied, basic aluminum dicarboxylates are formed and their morphology strongly depends on the structure of the carboxylic acid (Fig. 5). The crystalline products obtained in the reaction of boehmite with methacrylic, propionic or 4-hydroxybenzoic acids form nanofibers that affect in a positive way the mechanical properties of the cured unsaturated polyester resin (Table 2). The derivative containing unsaturated bonds as well as long aliphatic chains in its structure, exhibits high reactivity in radical copolymerisation with styrene or methyl methacrylate, which enables its practical application as a co-reagent during the crosslinking (Table 3, Fig. 7).