A statistical approach for tailoring the morphological and mechanical properties of polystyrene PolyHIPEs: looking through experimental design

The influence of experimental parameters on the morphological and mechanical properties of hierarchical macroporous polymers prepared via emulsion templating was investigated by using an experimental design approach. In this respect, the response surface experimental design methodology was used to determine the effect of four experimental factors at three levels, comprising crosslinker amount, surfactant amount, internal phase ratio, and mixing rate on the morphological and mechanical properties of polystyrene polyHIPEs. Three empirical model equation based on the remarked experimental factors were derived in order to estimate the compression modulus, average cavity size, and interconnected pore size of the resulting polyHIPEs.