Synthesis of Hyperbranched Polymer for 3D Printing

Main observation and conclusion 3D printing has been developing rapidly in recent years owing to its application in academic and industry areas, but the poor mechanical property of printing materials limits its application. Herein, a photocurable resin with good mechanical property was obtained based on hyperbranched polymer synthesized through the reaction of carboxylic acids with isocyanates catalyzed by magnesium stearate. Three kinds of hyperbranched polymers with different molecular weight were fabricated by modulating the content of isocyanates. By mixing hyperbranched polymer with acryloylmorpholine, polyethylene glycol diacrylate 400 and photoinitiator of 819, the photocurable resin was obtained. The influence of various factors on mechanical properties of samples was investigated such as molecular weight of hyperbranched polymer and the light exposure time. Comparing with the commercial resin, the flexural strength (116.06 MPa) and impact strength (34.59 kJ/m 2 ) of the resultant resin increased by 21.2% and 20.8%, respectively.