The effect of electrical power and air injection on the synthesis of starch modified-hybrid natural rubber by GDEP method

Natural rubber (NR) or latex are widely used as the base of elastomer products because of its superior mechanical flexibility. However, the modification of latex is still necessary to enhance other mechanical properties, which can be achieved by grafting material with high stiffness modulus like starch. Both NR and starch have a very different polarity, thus Glow Discharge Electrolysis Plasma (GDEP) method is used to overcome polarity difference and facilitates co-polymerization of starch-NR. The purpose of this research is to evaluate the effects of applied power (200-500 watt) and air injection (0.1-0.5 Liter/minute) to the anodic GDEP system. It is found that higher power with sufficient air injection results in the increase of product yield, process efficiency, and better product performance as coupling agent. The obtained optimum variable is 500-Watt power and 0.4 Liter/minute air injection for 24-minutes process, resulting in 100% yield, 65.46 kJ per gram product obtained, and 34.9o contact angle.