High-throughput system for thermoset polymer systems

• Subject Area: Materials Engineering
• Term: Funded in 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 544666834

The use of thermosetting polymer systems extends across various application areas such as coatings, adhesives, additive manufacturing, and fiber-reinforced components. Industries such as energy technology, electronics, mobility, and medicine utilize them in products like wind turbine blades, electric motor impregnating resins, printed circuit board substrates, aircraft fuselages, dental implants, and shoe insoles. The rapid technological development, new regulations, and sustainability goals demand quick responses from materials research with new or adapted materials. The development of such formulations, involving a variety of components and additives such as resins, hardeners, flame retardants, and fillers, is often lengthy and complex. For instance, in the development of a new formulation with ten resins, hardeners, fillers, and additives each, there are already 10E4 combinations, without even considering variations in stoichiometry, quantity ratios, and reaction conditions. Conventional laboratory experiments or systematic experimental design cannot cover the enormous possibilities. High-throughput systems offer automated, parallelizable capabilities for dosing, mixing, curing, and analyzing these formulations, enabling time, personnel, and material savings. Characterizations are reproducible even with small amounts of material, allowing for a deeper understanding in a short time. Currently, high-throughput systems are often used only for gas-phase reactions or liquid-liquid mixtures in chemistry, pharmaceuticals, or the paint industry. The dosing and mixing of highly viscous and rheologically complex components, as well as filled systems with a high proportion of fillers and additives, are currently extremely challenging and therefore have limited integration into high-throughput research. The proposed large-scale device aims to fill this gap by dosing and mixing highly viscous components, followed by curing the formulations. This opens up new possibilities for optimizing various thermosetting formulations. The device allows the production of up to 100 formulations per day and the automatic characterization of key properties such as mechanical and thermal characteristics as well as fire resistance properties. The generated data is centrally accessible and can be used for machine learning to identify complex relationships and support the development of complex multi-component formulations. This high-throughput system provides a sustainable, resource-efficient approach to materials research, opens up new research fields, and addresses the increasing demand for shortened development cycles and longer product lifespans.

• DFG Programme: Major Research Instrumentation
• Major Instrumentation: Hochdurchsatz-Anlage für duromere Polymersysteme
• Instrumentation Group: 1060 Dilutoren, Pipettiergeräte, Probennehmer
• Applicant Institution: Universität Bayreuth
• Leader: Professor Dr.-Ing. Holger Ruckdäschel