Experimental Study and Mathematical Modeling on Inverse Suspension Polymerization to the Acrylic Acid and Trimethilol Propane Triacrilate in Order to Produce Hydrogels

Abstract- In the present work, a kinetic model was applied using a population balance in order to simulate the reaction. The synthesis was conducted in a semi-batch mode controlling the process variables, using a small scale lab. A super water-absorbent polyacrylic acid was synthetized by inverse suspension polymerization, using Span60 as the dispersant, toluene as the organic phase, trimethiol propane triacrilate as the crosslink agent, and sodium persulfate as the initiator. The following reaction conditions were evaluated: effects of initiator concentration vs. temperature and percentage of multifunctional cross-linked (TMTPA) vs. monomer concentration. Also, two important properties were determined, the reaction conversion and gel fraction. The proposed model was validated from the experimental results which showed a satisfactory prediction of the system.