A Molecular-Level Study on the Interaction Behavior between Polyethylene and Aged Asphalt
Publication: International Conference on Transportation and Development 2022
ABSTRACT
Incorporating waste polymers into reclaimed asphalt is promising because of the large volume of asphalt produced and utilized worldwide. In this study, the effects of low-density polyethylene (LDPE) on the microstructure, viscosity, and self-diffusion of the aged asphalt were studied through molecular dynamics (MD) simulation. The aged asphalt model was constructed by including four characteristic components of saturates, aromatics, resins, and asphaltenes. An 8 wt% of LDPE was then added to the aged asphalt model, and the properties of the mixture were collected at 298 K. Our results reveal that LDPE has preferentially interactions with less polarized saturates and aromatics of the aged asphalt. From the radial distribution functional analysis, the low concentration of LDPE additives obviously changed the aggregation of saturates. However, the effect on the distributions of other compositions (aromatic/aromatic, resin/resin, and asphaltene/asphaltene) was found to be negligible. In addition, the viscosity and self-diffusion of the aged asphalt model remained almost unchanged by the addition of LDPE. This finding supports the common experimental practice of treating asphalt by 2–10 wt% LDPE.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this chapter.
REFERENCES
Anderson, D., Y. Hir, J.-P. Planche, D. Martin, and A. Shenoy. (2002). “Zero Shear Viscosity of Asphalt Binders.” Transportation Research Record 1810: 54–62.
Blom, J., H. Soenen, A. Katsiki, N. Van den Brande, H. Rahier, and W. van den Bergh. (2018). “Investigation of the bulk and surface microstructure of bitumen by atomic force microscopy.” Construction and Building Materials 177: 158–169.
Claine Petersen, J. (1998). “A Dual, Sequential Mechanism for the Oxidation of Petroleum Asphalts.” Petroleum Science and Technology 16(9-10): 1023–1059.
Dorrence, S., F. Barbour, and J. Petersen. (1974). “Direct evidence of ketones in oxidized asphalts.” Anal. Chem. 46.
Du, Z., C. Jiang, J. Yuan, F. Xiao, and J. Wang. (2020). “Low temperature performance characteristics of polyethylene modified asphalts–A review.” Construction and Building Materials 264: 120704.
Fischer, H., and E. Dillingh. (2014). “On the investigation of the bulk microstructure of bitumen–Introducing two new techniques.” Fuel 118: 365–368.
Genet, M. B., Z. B. Sendekie, and A. L. Jembere. (2021). “Investigation and optimization of waste LDPE plastic as a modifier of asphalt mix for highway asphalt: Case of Ethiopian roads.” Case Studies in Chemical and Environmental Engineering 4: 100150.
Guo, H. (2021). Interfacial adhesion performance between the low-density polyethylene (LDPE) modified bitumen and minerals based on molecular dynamics simulations, Aston University.
Hong, W., L. Mo, C. Pan, M. Riara, M. Wei, and J. Zhang. (2020). “Investigation of rejuvenation and modification of aged asphalt binders by using aromatic oil-SBS polymer blend.” Construction and Building Materials 231: 117154.
Kalantar, Z. N., M. R. Karim, and A. Mahrez. (2012). “A review of using waste and virgin polymer in pavement.” Construction and Building Materials 33: 55–62.
Li, D. D., and M. L. Greenfield. (2014). “Chemical compositions of improved model asphalt systems for molecular simulations.” Fuel 115: 347–356.
Martin, M. G., and J. I. Siepmann. (1999). “Novel configurational-bias Monte Carlo method for branched molecules. Transferable potentials for phase equilibria. 2. United-atom description of branched alkanes.” The Journal of Physical Chemistry B 103(21): 4508–4517.
Masad, E., K. L. Roja, A. Rehman, and A. Abdala. (2020). A review of asphalt modification using plastics: a focus on polyethylene. Texas A&M University: Qatar, Doha.
Nevins, D., and F. Spera. (2007). “Accurate computation of shear viscosity from equilibrium molecular dynamics simulations.” Molecular Simulation 33(15): 1261–1266.
Peng, C., C. Guo, Z. You, F. Xu, W. Ma, L. You, T. Li, L. Zhou, S. Huang, and H. Ma. (2020). “The Effect of Waste Engine Oil and Waste Polyethylene on UV Aging Resistance of Asphalt.” Polymers 12(3): 602.
Radhakrishnan, V., M. R. Sri, and K. S. Reddy. (2018). “Evaluation of asphalt binder rutting parameters.” Construction and Building Materials 173: 298–307.
Rappe, A. K., and W. A. Goddard III. (1991). “Charge equilibration for molecular dynamics simulations.” The Journal of Physical Chemistry 95(8): 3358–3363.
Robertson, R. E., J. Branthaver, H. Plancher, J. Duvall, E. Ensley, and P. Harnsberger. (1991). Chemical properties of asphalts and their relationship to pavement performance, National Research Council Washington, DC.
Sun, B., L. Lu, and Y. Zhu. (2019). “Molecular dynamics simulation on the diffusion of flavor, O2 and H2O molecules in LDPE film.” Materials 12(21): 3515.
Wang, P., Z.-J. Dong, Y.-Q. Tan, and Z.-Y. Liu. (2015). “Investigating the interactions of the saturate, aromatic, resin, and asphaltene four fractions in asphalt binders by molecular simulations.” Energy & Fuels 29(1): 112–121.
Xu, G., and H. Wang. (2017). “Molecular dynamics study of oxidative aging effect on asphalt binder properties.” Fuel 188: 1–10.
Xu, M., J. Yi, P. Qi, H. Wang, M. Marasteanu, and D. Feng. (2019). “Improved chemical system for molecular simulations of asphalt.” Energy & Fuels 33(4): 3187–3198.
Ye, X., X. Zou, F. Tian, and H. He. (2021). “Feasibility study on recycled vegetable oil waste and recycled polyethylene for the modification of aged asphalt.” Plos one 16(1): e0244159.
Yousefi, A. A. (2003). “Polyethylene dispersions in bitumen: the effects of the polymer structural parameters.” Journal of applied polymer science 90(12): 3183–3190.
Zhang, L., and M. L. Greenfield. (2007). “Molecular orientation in model asphalts using molecular simulation.” Energy & fuels 21(2): 1102–1111.
Zhang, X.-B., Z.-S. Li, Z.-Y. Lu, and C.-C. Sun. (2002). “The crystallization of low-density polyethylene: a molecular dynamics simulation.” Polymer 43(11): 3223–3227.
Zhao, M., F. Shen, and Q. Ding. (2018). “Micromechanism of the dispersion behavior of polymer-modified rejuvenators in aged asphalt material.” Applied Sciences 8(9): 1591.
Zhu, H., G. Xu, M. Gong, and J. Yang. (2017). “Recycling long-term-aged asphalts using bio-binder/plasticizer-based rejuvenator.” Construction and building materials 147: 117–129.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
International Conference on Transportation and Development 2022
Pages: 179 - 189
History
Published online: Aug 31, 2022
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.