SYNTHESIS OF SILICONE ELASTOMERS IN SILOXANE-ORGANIC NANOREACTORS

The unique properties of polysiloxanes recommend them for medical and personal care applications, but their liquid state at room temperature is a drawback for their use as nanoparticles in aqueous formulations. We present our first results concerning the feasibility of cross-linking reactions involving HO- terminated polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) chains and tetraethoxysilane (TEOS), in a sol-gel process going on inside surfactant micelles. We used an organosiloxane anionic surfactant in order to stabilize the formed nanoparticles. The monitoring of the polycondensation reactions has been made by FT-IR and the resulting particles have been analysed in dispersion by light scattering and in dry state by electron microscopy. Even for low crosslinking density, the particles size was of hundreds of nanometers and their spherical shape was maintained after drying. The spectral evidence proved that the reaction occurs inside the nanoreactors.