Processable crosslinked terpolymers made from elemental sulfur with wide range of thermal and mechanical properties

Elemental sulfur, a by-product of the purification of crude oil, is an underused material produced in excess. Inverse vulcanization, a process that uses comonomers to stabilise polymeric sulfur to form high sulfur content (>50 wt.%, normally) polymers, has emerged as a popular strategy for transforming this waste material, elemental sulfur, into functional polymers. Inverse vulcanized polymers are intrinsically processable and recyclable, and have been demonstrated as promising for applications in many fields. If this kind of material is to be widely used in some scenarios to replace some traditional plastics, it is necessary to make them with appropriate thermal and mechanical properties that meet the basic application requirements. Mechanical properties of inverse vulcanized polymers are currently under developed; research on sulfur polymers with a wide range of thermal properties and good mechanical properties needs to be developed. Here, we report series of terpolymers copolymerized from two distinct organic comonomers and elemental sulfur to obtain polymers with a wide range of glass transition temperature (-43 °C to 45 °C) and exhibiting good mechanical properties (varying from stiff and hard to flexible and tough), by blending crosslinkers with varying feed monomer ratio and varying chain length of linear sections, which expands the application opportunities of inverse vulcanization.