Encapsulation of inorganic particles by dispersion polymerization in polar media - 1. Silica nanoparticles encapsulated by polystyrene

Polymer encapsulation of small silica particles, using dispersion polymerization of styrene in aqueous ethanol medium with poly(N-vinyl pyrrolidone) (PVP) as stabilizer, is described. Silica particles, directly synthesized by the Stober process in an aqueous ethanol medium, are either unreacted (hydrophilic character) or coated with 3-(trimethoxysilyl)propyl methacrylate (MPS) (hydrophobic character), which is grafted at the silica particle surface. When the bare silica particles are used as the seed, there is a strong tendency of the silica beads to cover the surface of the polystyrene particles and obviously encapsulation does not occur. On the contrary, when the silica surface is made hydrophobic by coating, the inorganic particles are entirely contained in the polystyrene particles as evidenced by microscopy techniques (TEM, SEM, AFM). It is shown that some polystyrene chains are then chemically bonded to the silica particles, through the coupling agent MPS, and that only a small amount of bonded polystyrene, compared to the total polystyrene synthesized, is sufficient to obtain encapsulation of the silica particles with the entire amount of polystyrene synthesized during the polymerization. Under our experimental conditions, each polystyrene latex particle contains, on average, 4 to 23 silica beads depending, in particular; on the size of the silica. We believe that it is possible to control the composite particle size and morphology by a convenient choice of the composition of the system. Moreover, this new polymer-encapsulation process could be used to synthesize other organic-inorganic composite particles, using, for example, other monomers or minerals. (C) 1998 Academic Press.