Two-Dimensional Correlation Analysis of iPP Bead Foaming Thermal Features Modeled by Fast Scanning Calorimetry

The bead foaming of semicrystalline polymers is a complex thermal process involving the formation of multiple crystalline populations, which serve the dual purposes of ensuring the structural integrity of beads while also allowing bead sintering at the interface. The quality of this “double melting peak” structure is determined by the temperature and duration of the isothermal treatment of the beads as well as the quenching rate following the isotherm. Currently, the intricacies of the quenching process are not very well-known due to the challenge of replicating these rapid cooling rates in a laboratory setting. Fast-scanning calorimetry was used to reproduce these conditions for isotactic polypropylene (iPP), revealing optimal quenching rates for the bead foaming of iPP. We further probed these thermal features using two-dimensional correlation analysis as a tool to understand the dynamics, interdependence, and relative contributions of multiple thermal events such as glass transition, mesophase formation, cold crystallization, and melting in response to the perturbation of the quenching rate.