Effects of Polydispersity on the Order-Disorder Transition in Block Copolymer Melts
- UMM
We prepared controlled-polydispersity poly(ethylene-alt-propylene)-b-poly(DL-lactide) (PL) and polystyrene-b-polyisoprene (SI) block copolymers to study the effects of the molecular weight distribution on the order-disorder transition at controlled composition and overall molecular weight. Small-angle X-ray scattering and rheological measurements were carried out to characterize the changes in the order-disorder transition in these self-assembled materials as a function of their composition and polydispersity index. We determined that in both asymmetric PL and SI systems increasing polydispersity in the minority component resulted in a decrease in the segregation strength at the order-disorder transition, whereas increasing polydispersity in the majority component results in an increase in the segregation strength at the order-disorder transition. We speculate that increasing PDI in the majority domain weakens the effective potential holding the phase-separated microdomains ordered on a lattice.
- Research Organization:
- Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States). Advanced Photon Source (APS)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- OSTI ID:
- 1007606
- Journal Information:
- Macromolecules, Vol. 40, Issue (22) ; 2007
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- ENGLISH
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