Soybean oil induced efficient thermal–oxidative degradation of covalently crosslinked styrene butadiene rubber

It has been a technical challenge of recycling tire rubbers due to the covalently crosslinked polymer network structure. Unlike conventional recombination of crosslinked SBR under thermal oxidation, SBR vulcanizate was efficiently degraded by thermal oxidation at 150 °C in presence of soybean oil, resulting in 47.3% sol fraction by weight. The structural evolution of SBR vulcanizates during thermal oxidation was characterized by sol–gel ratio,...