Mark W. Beach

New class of brominated polymeric flame retardants for use in polystyrene foams

Flame retardant producers and end users are continually looking for more sustainable solutions through innovation in their customer offerings. Successful solutions need to satisfy a range of characteristics, from processing to technical and environmental performance, which sometimes conflict. This paper covers a new class of brominated polymeric flame retardants designed and developed by The Dow Chemical Company for use in polystyrene foam to meet existing fire and use requirements and have an improved environmental profile to meet regulatory guidelines. An overview of the environmental, health and safety performance of these new polymeric flame retardants will be presented along with preliminary performance data of their use in polystyrene foam.

Evaluation of Methods for Quantification of Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) Dispersions

Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) micrographs are routinely used to evaluate the dispersion of insoluble additives in polymeric systems. For routine TEM analysis, many analysts have relied on a visual analysis of the TEM micrographs to estimate the quality of the additive dispersion. When comparing large numbers of TEM micrographs, the ability to determine or estimate the dispersion quality is often difficult. The objective of this study was to develop a method to quantify dispersions observed in TEM micrographs that both enables a numerical “ranking” to be assigned to individual dispersions as well as enables tabulation of a multitude of images acquired over time. Several methods were reviewed and applied to a set of TEM dispersion images acquired of an insoluble additive in polystyrene.