• Composites Research
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.379-383
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• 2017

A study on the low Earth orbit (LEO) space environment have been conducted as a use of composites have increased. Among the LEO environmental factors, atomic oxygen is one of the most critical factors because atomic oxygen can react and erode a surface of polymer-based composite materials. POSS (Polyhedral Oligomeric Silsesquioxane) materials have been widely studied as an atomic oxygen-resistant nanomaterial. In this study, nanocomposites, which are composed of OG (Octaglycidyldimethylsilyl) POSS nanomaterials and DGEBA/DDM epoxy, were fabricated to find out its thermal and mechanical properties. FT-IR results showed that the nanocomposites were fully cured and contained OG POSS enough. Thermogravimetric analysis and differential scanning calorimetry were performed to measure the thermal properties of the nanocomposites. The initial mass loss temperature and char yield were increased through the filling of OG POSS. As the content of OG POSS increased, glass transition temperature tended to increase to 5 wt.% of OG POSS, but the temperature decreased significantly at 10 wt.% of OG POSS. The tensile test results showed that the content of OG POSS did not affect tensile strength and tensile stiffness.