Smart numerical method for calculation of simple general infrared parameter identifying binary rubber blends

Abstract

In the present work, binary blends of carbon black-filled cured rubber, composed of natural rubber (NR) and styrene butadiene rubber (SBR) at three different blend ratios, were subjected to Fourier Transform Infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopic study in attenuated total reflection (ATR) mode. The objective was to use the infrared spectra obtained to calculate a simple general infrared blend parameter (PIR), a characteristic of the NR-SBR blend. The calculation for determining PIR required finding the exact infrared (IR) peak heights for NR and SBR, at 1375 and 699 cm−1, respectively. To obtain the exact peak heights, each of the spectra originally obtained from the IR spectrophotometer was modified using a newly developed numerical algorithmic method of baseline creation on and subsequent subtraction from the original spectrum. A very good baseline fit was achieved using this method. As a result, the numerical calculation of PIR for the NR-SBR blend was possible. © 2016 Elsevier Ltd