The development of polymer blends and blend compatibilizers is a very active area of polymer technology. This area is of great economic importance, not only for the plastics industry but also for other industries where the use of polymer blends is becoming increasingly more common.
Many articles are published on polymer blends and blend additives in trade journals. These articles typically focus on applications, market trends, and recent news from specific vendors. The present article has a different emphasis. It is intended to provide a better understanding of what may be referred to as the "practical fundamentals" of blend compatibilization. These are the five key factors that every polymer blend and blend compatibilization additive developer must consider in order to improve the likelihood of achieving technical and commercial success simultaneously.
In this equation, Price2>Price1, Performance2>Performance1 are the corresponding performance levels, "c" is a positive proportionality constant, and "ln" is the natural logarithm. See Figure 1 for a schematic illustration.