In-situ preparation of biopolymer/Fe3O4 hybrid nanocomposites in supercritical carbon dioxide

Poly(2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate) magnetic nanocomposites was synthesized by dispersion polymerization in supercritical carbon dioxide in the presence of 3-(trimethoxysilyl) propylmethacrylate surface modified Fe
3
O
4
nanoparticles using poly(DMAEMA-co-FOMA) a stabilizer. The resulting products were characterized for structure, morphology, thermal behavior by FT-IR, TEM, TGA, XRD, and XPS techniques. These studies indicated that Fe
3
O
4
nanocomposites were coated with a polymer layer. Magnetic property of the nanocomposites was measured using MPMS XL 7.0, which indicated that the nanocomposites are superparamagnetic and a saturation magnetization of 5.5 emu/g with 40% Fe
3
O
4
content.