Abstract
Recent advancements in polymer science and manufacturing technologies triggered new developments of porous materials used for mitigating heat losses, such as thermal insulating polymeric foams. The major bottleneck in the optimization of these products, however, remains the absence of analytical methods able to scrutinize their large design space reasonably quickly and cost-effectively. This manuscript targets the paucity of data for polymeric foams by illustrating, at a proof-of-principle level, that several well-established analytical methods including optical microscopy, pycnometry, dielectric spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis, and nuclear magnetic resonance can be exploited for an extensive, yet logistically efficient, characterization of these materials. The purpose of this study is thus introducing an experimental platform for the characterization of market foam products and for the development of new polymeric foams with pore sizes that are particularly relevant for industrial and residential thermal insulation. Since this work introduces several new methodologies, it may be used as a guide for both laboratory users and specialists in the field, who may further improve the herein proposed experimental concepts.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | e36074 |
| Journal | Heliyon |
| Volume | 10 |
| Issue number | 16 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Aug 30 2024 |
Funding
This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC, under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy (DOE). The US government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the US government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for US government purposes. DOE will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan ( http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan ). This work is supported by the projects \u201CMulti-Scale Simulations and Machine Learning-Guided Design and Synthesis of High-Performance Thermal Insulation Materials\u201D and \u201CBarrier Facers for Aged Foam Boards with >R8/in\u201D funded by the Building Technologies Office, Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy at the US Department of Energy This work is supported by the projects \u201CMulti-Scale Simulations and Machine Learning-Guided Design and Synthesis of High-Performance Thermal Insulation Materials\u201D and \u201CBarrier Facers for Aged Foam Boards with >R8/in\u201D funded by the Buil\u015Bding Technologies Office, Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy at the US Department of Energy.This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC, under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy (DOE). The US government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the US government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for US government purposes. DOE will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan).
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| U.S. Department of Energy | |
| Thelma Doelger Trust for Animals | |
| Building Technologies Office | |
| Forecast Public Art | |
| Office of Energy Efficiency: Buildings and Industry | DE-AC05-00OR22725 |
| Office of Energy Efficiency: Buildings and Industry |
Keywords
- Closed-cell foams
- Dielectric spectroscopy
- Mass spectrometry
- Nuclear magnetic resonance
- Optical microscopy
- Polymeric materials
- Pycnometry
- Thermogravimetric analysis