Influence of Sonication on Morphological Properties of Poly(Vinyl Acetate) Particles Produced Through Suspension Polymerization

摘要

The use of polymers for various medical purposes has increased significantly over the past few years, including vascular embolization procedures. The main challenge in this particular case is the development of embolic agents with suitable properties in order to render the application safer and reproducible. In this context, particle density plays a fundamental role in vascular embolization performance, since off-spec values can lead to undesired sedimentation of particles during the medical procedure. The influence of sonication power on the morphology of polymer particles produced through suspension polymerizations was investi- gated in the present work, as well as the effects of adding polymer material into the initialmonomer dispersion on the finalmorphological properties of the product. It is shown in particular that the investigated morphological properties (density, shape, porosity) depend on the operation conditions on manners that have not been discussed in the literature.