Deformulation (Reverse Engineering) of Adhesives & Sealants
Deformulation, or reverse engineering, is the breaking down of a formulation into its basic components, providing a list of ingredients and their relative concentrations. The deformulation of adhesives and sealants is often used to provide a comparative analysis or answer questions of quality.
Adhesives and sealants usually have only a few components, but in order to deformulate the material, these components must be separated before they can be identified and quantified.
The first step is usually extraction with proprietary solvents. Extractions of adhesives and sealants tend to be more difficult since many components have similar chemistries and the separations are not as clean.
Once materials are isolated, they can be identified using a number of analytical techniques such as Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) and Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC).
