Investigation of the effect of different percentages of material on the microstructure and morphology of montmorillonite nanoparticles

In this research, Montmorillonite clay nanoparticles were produced using mechanical methods and the effect of different percentages of tetra n-butyl ammonium chloride (TNBAC) as a surfactant and butyl ammonium chloride as a modifier (TNBAC) was performed. The microstructural and morphological properties of montmorillonite clay nanoparticles in the presence and absence of surfactant as well as surface modifier were investigated using modern identifying materials methods including XRD, FTIR, FESEM, ZETA POTENTIAL. XRD results show that, the montmorillonite and quartz phases in all samples, which was consistent with the FTIR results. The results of electron microscopy show that, with increasing surfactant the agglomeration was decreased and the range of particle size was about 10 to 30 nm. The results of zeta potential test and its comparison indicated a good modification of the surface of nano-montmorillonite and with increasing the modifier, the amount of charge increased and the zeta potential become more positive.