To investigate the utility of acrylic monomers from various plant oils in adhesives manufacturing, 25-45 wt. % of high oleic soybean oil-based monomer (HOSBM) was copolymerized in a miniemulsion with commercially applied butyl acrylate (BA), methyl methacrylate (MMA), or styrene (St). The compositions of the resulting ternary latex copolymers were varied in terms of both "soft" (HOSBM, BA) and "rigid" (MMA or St) macromolecular fragments, while total monomer conversion and molecular weight of copolymers were determined after synthesis. For most latexes, results indicated the presence of lower and higher molecular weight fractions, which is beneficial for the material adhesive performance. To correlate surface properties and adhesive performance of HOSBM-based copolymer latexes, contact angle hysteresis (using water as a contact liquid) for each latex-substrate pair was first determined. The data showed that plant oil-based latexes exhibit a clear ability to spread and adhere once applied on the surface of materials differing by polarities, such as semicrystalline polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polypropylene (PP), bleached paperboard (uncoated), and tops coated with a clay mineral paperboard. The effectiveness of plant oil-based ternary latexes as adhesives was demonstrated on PET to PP and coated to uncoated paperboard substrates. As a result, the latexes with high biobased content developed in this study provide promising adhesive performance, causing substrate failure instead of cohesive/adhesive break in many experiments.
Keywords: biobased latexes; miniemulsion polymerization; plant oil-based acrylic monomers; plant oils; waterborne contact adhesive.