Impact of cellulose ethers on the cement paste microstructure

Jérémie Pourchez (1, 2, 3) , Philippe Grosseau (1, 2, 3) , Emilie Rouèche-Pourchez (1, 3, 4) , Johan Debayle (3, 5, 6) , Jean-Charles Pinoli (3, 5, 6) , Eric Maire (7) , Elodie Boller (8) , Estelle Parra-Denis (9)

1 SPIN-ENSMSE - Centre Sciences des Processus Industriels et Naturels
2 P2MC-ENSMSE - Département Poudres et Matériaux Multi-Composants
3 LPMG-EMSE - Laboratoire des Procédés en Milieux Granulaires
4 ProcESS-ENSMSE - Département Procédés et évolution des systèmes avec solides
5 CIS-ENSMSE - Centre Ingénierie et Santé
6 DIS-ENSMSE - Département Imagerie et Statistiques
7 MATEIS - Matériaux, ingénierie et science [Villeurbanne]
8 ESRF - European Synchrotron Radiation Facility
9 LHC - Laboratoire Hubert Curien

Complementary investigation tools (2D and 3D observations by optical microscopy and fast X-ray microtomography and then image analysis) were developed in order to examine the effects of cellulose ethers on the cement paste microstructure. The obtained results show that the presence of cellulose ether may induce an increase of both 50-250 µm-diameter air voids. The chemistry of the cellulose ethers appears as a main controlling factor of this porous media modification. In particular, cellulose ethers seems to play an important role on the air bubbles morphological characteristics, the content of air volume and the stabilisation of the porosity from the fresh cement paste to the hardened cement paste.

Keywords: image analysis; cellulose ethers; cement; microstructure; optical microscopy; fast X-ray microtomography

Domains: Other

Jérémie Pourchez, Philippe Grosseau, Emilie Rouèche-Pourchez, Johan Debayle, Jean-Charles Pinoli, et al.. Impact of cellulose ethers on the cement paste microstructure. 10th International Conference and Exhibition of the European Ceramic Society, Jun 2007, Berlin, Germany. pp.2045-2050. ⟨hal-00297256⟩