Jan 18, 2017
Siloxane compounds were well known in the1960s, but it was not until the 1940s that Dr. Eugene RoChow pioneered the workof commercializing such important compounds. The chemical nature of siloxanesallows polymer chemists to build accurate molecular structures using idealnanotechnology. The siloxane polymer is derived from silica (Si02), whichaccounts for 25% of the total crust. In the presence of a carbon source, thesilica is converted to a siloxane at elevated temperatures. The resulting metalis then pulverized and injected into a fluidized bed reactor to obtain achlorine-containing compound chlorosilane.
The chlorosilane is placed in water,hydrochloric acid (HCl) is released, after distillation and multi-steppurification, resulting in a series of siloxane structural units. The mostimportant of these are hexamethyldisiloxane (MM), cyclomethicone (D4) andSilanic hydrogen (Si-H) compounds. These materials can be combined in a varietyof ways to produce important siloxane polymers.