Alharbe, L.G., Register, R.A. and Hobbs, J.K. (2017) Orientation Control and Crystallization in a Soft Confined Phase Separated Block Copolymer. Macromolecules, 50 (3). pp. 987-996. ISSN 0024-9297
Abstract
Microdomain orientation and crystallization were examined in a crystalline-amorphous diblock copolymer, hydrogenated poly(high-1,4-butadiene)-b-poly(high-3,4-isoprene) (E/MB), which forms cylinders of the crystallizable block (polyethylene, E). Atomic force microscopy (AFM) was used to locally control the orientation of the E cylinders. The orientation process and subsequent crystallization behavior were investigated in situ as a function of temperature by AFM. Fully confined crystallization was observed within the range 25-50 °C, with templated and breakout crystallization observed at higher crystallization temperature. The growth rate of templated crystallization along and perpendicular to the existing microdomain structure was measured, and the ratio between these rates was found to increase rapidly with decreasing temperature with a change from ∼4.8 at 100 °C to ∼8 at 97 °C. Two maxima in the degree of orientation of the crystallized regions were found: one at relatively small supercoolings (e.g., 95 °C) where the differential in growth rate along and across microdomain boundaries is high and one at high supercoolings (25-50 °C) where crystallization is completely dominated by nucleation.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
---|---|
Authors/Creators: |
|
Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2017 American Chemcial Society. ACS AuthorChoice - This is an open access article published under an ACS AuthorChoice (http://pubs.acs.org/page/policy/authorchoice_termsofuse.html) which permits copying and redistribution of the article or any adaptations for non-commercial purposes |
Dates: |
|
Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Science (Sheffield) > Department of Physics and Astronomy (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 06 Mar 2017 14:47 |
Last Modified: | 01 Feb 2018 01:39 |
Published Version: | https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.macromol.6b02361 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | American Chemical Society |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1021/acs.macromol.6b02361 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:113045 |