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ISSN Druckformat: 2150-766X
ISSN Online: 2150-7678
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SENSITIVITY OF POLYMER-BONDED EXPLOSIVES FROM MOLECULAR MODELING DATA
ABSTRAKT
Sensitive energetic materials are an issue for military and civilian applications. To prevent undesired explosions, sensitive energetic materials are embedded in a protective polymer, resulting in polymer-bonded explosives (PBX). The appropriate polymer will absorb part of the energy caused by stimuli such as shock, impact, friction, and heat, thus decreasing sensitivity. To investigate how an appropriate polymer absorbs energy, three PBX models were simulated using molecular dynamics. The COMPASS force field implemented in the Materials Studio software was used. Molecular dynamics simulations were performed for three RDX-based formulations in which a single polymer chain (HTPB, Estane, or EVA) was placed at the boundary surface of an RDX crystal. Simulations were carried out at high temperature (700 K) and high pressure (15 GPa). The resulting models were analyzed in terms of potential energy increase, energy distribution, and values of the different potential energy contributions for RDX/HTPB, RDX/Estane, and RDX/EVA. The polymer binders HTPB, Estane, and EVA in such PBX formulations absorbed between 24% and 31% of internal energy, respectively, thereby making less sensitive PBXs formulations than pure RDX. This percentage is proposed as an indicator key for experimentalists to determine the most efficient polymer that can be used, for a given explosive, to minimize munition sensitivity. A clear correlation is established between the calculated absorption of internal energy by polymers and experimental sensitivity values for the three formulations studied under extreme experimental conditions. This approach may be applied to other new formulations prior to testing them in laboratories.
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Huang Ying, Gou Ruijun, Zhang Shuhai, Yuan Xiaofeng, Chen Yahong, Comprehensive theoretical study on safety performance and mechanical properties of 3-nitro-1,2,4-triazol-5-one (NTO)–based polymer-bonded explosives (PBXs) via molecular dynamics simulation, Journal of Molecular Modeling, 28, 12, 2022. Crossref