Effects of functional group polarity on interfacial behavior of non-polar polyarylacetylene resin-silica glass composites

The present work concentrated on the investigation of the influence of functional group polarity on interfacial behavior of silica glass and polyarylacetylene (PAA) resin composites. In order to achieve this purpose, the silica glass was treated with four types of silane coupling agents: 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane; 3-glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane; anilinomethyltriethoxysilane and propyltrimethoxysilane. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) was used to examine the topographies of the resulting silica glass surface. The surface energy estimation and the contact angle testing were used to characterize the wetability of the PAA resin on silica glass surface. In addition, the fracture morphology analysis and shear strength testing were used to evaluate the interfacial adhesion of silica glass/PAA resin composites. The results indicated that the interfacial performance of the composites improved with the polarity of functional groups which was included in silane coupling agents.