Preparation of low density trimethylol propane triacrylate foams

Using trimethylol propane triacrylate (TMPTA) as the initial material, low density TMPTA foam columns were successfully prepared by UV irradiation technique and freezing-drying process. These foam columns have the density range of 4 mg/cm3to 20 mg/cm3and they can sustain themselves. The shrinkage of the foams results in δ, which is defined as the ratio of the factual density to the theoretic density, is larger than 1, and δ decreases with the theoretic density increasing. It is found that the TPMTA foams are thermally stable up to 290° by TGA analysis. The foams have uniform and open network structure as demonstrated by SEM. Hg porosimetry tests show that the pore size of these foams mainly distributes in the range of 3.0 μm to 7.5 μm and the average pore size is 7.37 μm.