Incorporation of high oil content in polyvinyl acetate nanoparticles produced by batch miniemulsion polymerization stabilized with a polymeric stabilizer

Nanoparticles (NPs) have been widely applied in the biomedical area. In order to satisfy the requirements for biomedical applications, sodium lauril sulfate (SLS) and hexadecane, widely used as anionic surfactant and co‐stabilizer, were successfully replaced by biocompatible compounds, in order to obtain poly(vinyl acetate) (PVAc) NPs via miniemulsion polymerization. The incorporation of high oil content in PVAc NPs was investigated, using different poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVOH) concentrations as polymeric surfactant. Besides the polymeric surfactant, lecithin and Miglyol 812, a triacylglycerol of saturated fatty acids obtained from coconut oil, were used as surfactant and co‐stabilizer, respectively. A high Miglyol 812 content was incorporated in the PVAc NPs and the morphology was investigated by TEM. The influence of PVOH concentration on the droplet nucleation mechanism and final morphology of PVAc NPs was evaluated. High PVOH concentration favored micellar particle nucleation. According to the TEM images, hemispheres nanoparticles were obtained. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2015 , 132, 41365.