A potentially inexpensive alternative epoxy resin system based on soybean oil has been developed for polymer composite applications. Epoxidized methyl soyate (EMS) and epoxidized allyl soyate (EAS) have been synthesized at the University of Missouri-Rolla. These materials consist of mixtures of epoxidized fatty acid esters. The epoxidized soy-based resins provide better intermolecular crosslinking and yield materials that are stronger than materials obtained with commercially available epoxidized soybean oil (ESO). The curing behavior and glass transition have been monitored with differential scanning calorimetry.Neat resin test samples have been fabricated from resin systems containing various amounts of EMS, EAS, and ESO. Standardized tests have shown that the addition of EAS enhances the tensile and flexural properties of the base epoxy resin system. Therefore, epoxidized soy ester additives hold great potential for environmentally friendly and lower cost raw materials for the fabrication of epoxy composites for structural applications.

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Epoxidized allyl soyate (EAS), a novel soy based epoxy resin, has been prepared by the process of transesterfication and epoxidation of regular food grade soybean oil. Two types of crosslinking agents were employed in this study. The effects of the concentration of EAS and the type of crosslinking agent on the dynamic mechanical behavior of the soy based resin system have been investigated. The room temperature storage moduli (EЈ) and the glass transition temperatures (T g ) increased for the anhydride cured and decreased for the amine cured resins. The loss tangent maximum (tan ␦) max decreased for anhydride cured resins and increased for amine cured resins. The effect of frequency on the storage modulus was also studied. Master curves were constructed by the time-temperature superpositioning technique (TTS) to predict the storage modulus at times and temperatures that are not experimentally feasible. The results indicate that soy based epoxy resins with appropriate concentrations hold great potential as a replacement for petroleum based materials in noise and vibration attenuation applications.

In this article solvothermally synthesized copper selenide nanostructures have been resported as highly efficient electrocatalysts for carbon dioxide reduction under ambient conditions with high selectivity for carbon-rich C2 products at...

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