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• CRM with and without diesel pre-swelling was radiated by microwave. • Composition of compound activated CRM were different from untreated sample. • Binders modified with compound activated CRM showed improving performance. • Microwave radiation could improve thermal storage stability of CRM modified binders. Some novel methods are introduced to improve thermal storage stability and pavement performance of crumb rubber modified binder. In this paper, the objective was to investigate the effects of compound activation on the molecular structure and physical properties of crumb rubber, as well as rheological properties and thermal storage stability of crumb rubber modified binders. Two activation methods, with and without diesel pre-swelling, and six microwave radiation intensities were designed in this study. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) test, swelling equilibrium test and dynamic mechanical thermal analyzer (DMA) test were performed to evaluate the characteristic functional groups and physical properties of crumb rubbers before and after activation. Additionally, rheological properties test at various service temperatures and thermal storage stability test were carried out on the crumb rubber modified binders. The results show that certain microwave radiation intensity would break the C-S and C=S bonds and reduces the cross-linking density of crumb rubber. Activation mode was the main factor affecting high temperature stability, fatigue life and low temperature relaxation property rather than microwave radiation intensity compared with control one. In addition, thermal storage stabilities of activated crumb rubber modified binders were better than control one. The more radiation intensity, the improvement effect of thermal storage stability is. Synthesizes each kind of property, diesel pre-swelling and microwave radiation intensity of 1.2 kJ/g was a preferable combination in this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]