A novel staining technique for studying toughening mechanisms in saturated acrylic rubber-modified polymers

A novel technique which utilizes a two-stage staining approach, (i.e., styrene absorption followed by osmium tetraoxide staining) is introduced for staining saturated polyacrylate rubbers. This novel staining approach, which stains and hardens polyacrylate rubber, is found to be useful for room temperature microtomy of polyacrylate rubber-modified polymers. Therefore, both the morphology and the crack tip toughening mechanisms of polyacrylate rubber-modified systems can be studied. Details concerning staining time, staining media, and use of solvents are discussed.