Weathering of low‐density polyethylene grafted with itaconic acid in laboratory tests

Polyethylene grafted with itaconic acid was subjected to weathering under laboratory accelerated conditions. The course of the photo‐oxidative degradation process of that material was studied by FTIR spectroscopy both through quantitative measurements of changes in absorbance values at selected wave numbers and through measurements of surface area values for absorption bands which were separated by means of deconvolution. The use of both those procedures of quantitative determinations resulted in a general conclusion that the oxidation process was initiated from the very first moment of irradiation, and it produced ketones, acids, esters (intramolecular and of acetate type), peracids, peresters, hydroperoxides, and alcohols. The molecular weight values and gel number values, which were established as well, pointed out that oxidation was accompanied by cracking of polymer macromolecules, and also by polymer crosslinking to a limited degree. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2012