Using Multivariate Modeling and Optimization for Rapidly Developing New and Improved Elastomers

The continual development of new functional polymers with improved properties and of new products for different application areas is an important area for most chemical companies.  There are basically 3 general degrees of freedom in developing a new product: (i) the choice of raw materials or ingredients (eg. Specific rubbers, oils, polyolefins, etc.), (ii) the ratios in which to combine thee materials (formulation or recipe), and (iii) the process conditions under which to process them.  These three degrees of freedom are highly interactive, making it important to consider all of them simultaneously. 

In this presentation we discuss multivariate latent variable analysis methods for extracting information from the development databases, multivariate DOE approaches for optimally augmenting the databases, and optimization methods for rapidly formulating products that meet all the desired quality specifications at minimum cost.

Some examples of using this approach include the development of functional polymers for medical devices and for the core materials used in the very popular Srixon golf balls (now used by a large number of the tour pros), the development of novel high performance polymeric coatings, and the development of new food formulations.