Growing up on a small dairy farm in Canton, Pennsylvania, Ronald Saxton (1927 – 2019) earned a bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering from Penn State University in 1950, followed by a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois in 1953.

Dr. Saxton then joined the DuPont Chemical Company at Experimental Station in Wilmington, Delaware, where he became part of the Polymer Processing Extrusion Group. He quickly became an expert in viscous mixing, heat transfer, process scaleup, and reactive extrusion.

During his thirty-seven-year career, Saxton pioneered mixing small molecular materials, including oils, water, reactive reagents, and gases, into viscous resins using single-screw extruders. He developed and patented a device providing optimum distributive and dispersive mixing to complex mixtures. That device, known today as the Saxton Mixer, has enabled the progress of reactive extrusion technology, which has led to the development and commercialization of ionomer resins through the neutralization of acid copolymers of polyethylene.

Today, DuPont manufactures those ionomer resins under the SurlynTM trademark. They are used in applications ranging from golf balls to orthotics and prosthetics.

The Saxton Mixer was also used in foam sheet production and was a key enabler in commercializing physical blowing agents for foam sheet applications. In 2016, Saxton was awarded the SPE Extrusion Division Bruce Maddock Award.