Commonly found in coatings and inkjet inks, solvents vary in their ability to dissolve solutes and how safe they are to use. Kouji Nakajima looks at a reduced-toxicity amide-ether option.
Having high heat resistance, Polyamideimides (PAI) and polyimides (PI) are widely used as insulating varnish materials in the application to the coils of electronic devices and high performance coatings – this market is expected to be continuously high growth with the spread of electric vehicles etc. However, PAI and PI are poorly-soluble polymers, making them difficult to dissolve completely using solvents. Typically, non-ionic polar solvents such as N-Methyl pyrrolidone (NMP) and Dimethyl formamide (DMF) have been used to tackle this issue, but due to the safety concerns such as reproductive toxicity, various alternative solvents have been looked into.