Abstract: An ethylene-propylene copolymer(EPM) has been functionalized with acrylic acid(AA) by means of a radical-initiated melt process.Different degrees of grafting have been obtained by varying the overall composition of the reaction mixture.The influence of the grafting degree on the structure has been investigated by differential scanning calorimetry(DSC),fourier transform infrared analysis(FTIR) and wide angle X-ray scattering(WAXS) techniques.The results of structural investigations suggest that the grafting preferentially occurs onto the ethylene sequences of EPM.After acrylic acid was grafted onto EPM,the grafted PAA acted as a nucleation agent,and it caused the increase of crystallization temperature of propylene sequences of EPM-g-PAA.

Key words: EPM, EPM-g-PAA, nucleation agent, crystallization temperatrure