Polyethylene/layered‐silicate nanocomposite oriented fibers: morphology and mechanical characterization. In Abstracts from National Young Researchers' Forum on Materials Science and Technology, XIII AIMAT National Congress, National Biomaterial Congress - SIB, July 2016, Ischia, Italy

Organo-modified montmorillonite clay layers are able to improve not only mechanical properties but also heat resistance, barrier properties and flammability of polymeric matrixes. To this extent, processing parameters are important for non-polar polymers, like polyolefin, and compatibilizers are necessary to obtain exfoliated/intercalated morphologies. Polyethylene fibers are widely used due to the good achievable mechanical properties after drawing which can be further increased by the use of properly exfoliated nanoclays. The aim of this work was to produce nanocompos-ite polyethylene fibers oriented at different draw ratios and to correlate this processing parameters to morphology and mechanical properties of fibers produced at various clay loading.