Diazonium salt-based photoiniferter as a new efficient pathway to clay–polymer nanocomposites

Clay–polymer nanocomposites were prepared by living free radical photopolymerization initiated from a lamellar clay-anchored photoiniferter resulting from a cation exchange reaction of sodium by diethyldithiocarbamate benzyldiazonium tetra-fluoroborate salt. The success of the cation exchange process, followed by iniferter graft polymerization of glycidyl methacrylate (GMA) on clay nanoplatelets was confirmed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Thereby, the original cation exchange method induced by diazonium salt produces intercalated nanocomposite materials with an important organic mass loading around 41 wt%. More importantly, the content of the organic component included in the final nanocomposite material could be controlled by the diazonium salt concentration used during the synthesis.