Toughness of Natural Rubber Composites Reinforced with Hydrolyzed and Modified Wheat Gluten Aggregates

摘要

The toughness of natural rubber can be improved by using fillers for various rubber applications. Dry wheat gluten is a protein from wheat flour and is sufficiently rigid for rubber reinforcement. The wheat gluten was hydrolyzed to reduce its particle size and microfluidized to reduce and homogenize the particle size and size distribution. The processed wheat gluten aggregates with a size of similar to 500 nm were used to improve the toughness of natural rubber. The crosslinked rubber composites showed an improvement in moduli, tensile strength and toughness compared to natural rubber; had a greater toughness and elongation than the carbon black filled composites at higher filler fractions. For the composites prepared under the alkali condition, the modified particles increased the moduli in the larger strain region. For the composites prepared under the acidic condition, the modified particles improved the tensile strength, elongation, and toughness. The reinforced composites were characterized with stress-strain, dynamic frequency sweep, and swelling experiments to understand their structure-properties.