Rapid Development of New Polymer Blends:  The Optimal Selection of Materials and Blend Ratios

A data-based approach to the development of industrial polymer blends with specified final properties is presented. There are basically three major degrees of freedom to control the final product properties: the selection of raw materials, the selection of the ratios in which to blend them, and the selection of process conditions used to manufacture them. In this paper, we present a new optimization approach that simultaneously addresses all of these degrees of freedom, but the primary focus will be on the selection of the materials and their ratios. The approach involves building partial least-squares (PLS) models that combine databases on previously made blends and databases on the properties of the component materials used in these blends. The resulting models are then used in an optimization framework to select raw materials from much larger databases (including materials never previously used) and to select the ratios in which to blend them in order to yield a blend product with specified end properties at a minimum cost. The methodology is applied to two industrial polymer blending problems that involve the replacement of raw materials while keeping the same product properties and minimizing total raw material cost.