Search results for "polymers"
showing 10 items of 3567 documents
New amphiphilic terphenyl liquid crystals for the preparation of highly ordered ultrathin films
1991
Four new amphiphilic liquid crystals have been synthesized, in which terphenyl was used as the mesogenic unit. In order to enable the formation of Langmuir Monolayers at the air/water-interface, the molecules were equipped with slightly polar headgroups such as esters or a carboxylic acid group. All compounds can be transferred onto solid substrates. In addition, it is possible to prepare freely suspended films of at least one compound in the temperature range of the smectic phases. The phases of the different states, bulk, monolayer, freely suspended film, and Langmuir-Blodgett multilayers have been investigated by means of monolayer isotherms, optical textures, differential scanning calor…
A compact Raman microprobe/microscope: Analysis of polydiacetylene Langmuir and Langmuir-Blodgett films
1991
A compact Raman microprobe/microscope has been developed which contains no wavelength dispersive elements. Multilayer dielectric filters, tuned by rotation, provide sufficient wavelength selectivity for taking Raman spectra and forming Raman images of samples as small as 1 μm in diameter. The application of the instrument is demonstrated by Raman spectra and images of polydiacetylene Langmuir and Langmuir-Blodgett films.
Stereospecific Polymerization of Isoprene with Nd(BH4)3(THF)3/MgBu2 as Catalyst
2004
The neodymium trisborohydride Nd(BH 4 ) 3 - (THF) 3 (THF = tetrahydrofuran) has been used as a catalyst precursor for isoprene polymerization for the first time. Associated to an excess of Al(Et) 3 , the resulting catalyst is moderately active, giving a mixture of cis- and trans- polymer. Addition of a stoichiometric amount of MgBu 2 to Nd(BH 4 ) 3 (THF) 3 affords a stereospecific catalyst providing trans-1,4-polyisoprene, more than 96% regular. That dual component Nd/Mg system also shows a better efficiency and good control of the molecular weights. A molecular structure is tentatively attributed to a bimetallic active species, based on 1 H NMR experiments.
Effect of the remaining lanthanide catalysts on the hydrolytic and enzymatic degradation of poly-(ε-caprolactone)
2003
Poly-(e-caprolactone) is a biodegradable polymer, which can be used for both medical and environmental applications. Due to its multiple applications the synthesis of such a polymer has been attracting an increasing attention in the past few decades. In our work, the polymers were synthesised by bulk polymerisation, using different lanthanide halides as initiators. The lanthanide derivatives are known as very active catalysts in the ring-opening polymerisation of cyclic esters. Moreover, they are not toxic in comparison of catalysts, which are usually used for this synthesis. In this paper, the influence of the lanthanides on both the hydrolytic and enzymatic degradation of the PCL obtained…
Unusual finite size effects in the Monte Carlo simulation of microphase formation of block copolymer melts
1995
Extensive Monte Carlo simulations are presented for the Fried-Binder model of block copolymer melts, where polymer chains are represented as self and mutually avoiding walks on a simple cubic lattice, and monomer units of different kind (A, B) repel each other if they are nearest neighbors (e AB > O). Choosing a chain length N = 20, vacancy concentration Φ v = 0,2, composition f = 3/4, and a L × L × L geometry with periodic boundary conditions and 8 ≤ L ≤ 32, finite size effects on the collective structure factor S(q) and the gyration radii are investigated. It is shown that already above the microphase separation transition, namely when the correlation length ζ(T) of concentration fluctuat…
X-ray scattering studies of the structure of aqueous hydroxy-propylcellulose solutions
1991
X-ray diffraction studies have been undertaken on aqueous solutions of hydroxy propylcellulose (HPC) over a wide range of the scattering vector Q. The experiments revealed only modest differences in local structure on a distance scale ca. 5–300 A despite the fact that they covered concentrations generally interpreted as ranging from the isotropic (35.1 wt %) to the anisotropic liquid crystalline (LC) phase (53.5 wt %). Several models were used to interpret the small-angle scattering data, and each gave similar structural parameters and extrapolated intensities (Q → 0) for both solutions. Peaks were observed with d-spacings ca. 12–17 A in both materials. Wide-angle x-ray scattering (WAXS) sh…
Orientation of polybutadiene chains in a thermoplastic elastomer
1996
The orientation of polybutadiene chains in thermoplastic elastomers based on hydrogen bonding complexes is investigated under uniaxial deformation by two-dimensional small-angle neutron scattering (SANS), deuteron magnetic resonance spectroscopy (2H-NMR), optical birefringence and infrared dichroism spectroscopy (FTIR-D). While SANS probes orientation on the length scale of the radius of gyration,2H-NMR, birefringence and FTIR-D monitor orientation on a segmental scale. The deformation of the elastomer chains appears to be affine on the different length scales.
Length-scale effects in the nucleation of extended dislocations in nanocrystalline Al by molecular-dynamics simulation
2001
The nucleation of extended dislocations from the grain boundaries in nanocrystalline aluminum is studied by molecular-dynamics simulation. The length of the stacking fault connecting the two Shockley partials that form the extended dislocation, i.e., the dislocation splitting distance, rsplit, depends not only on the stacking-fault energy but also on the resolved nucleation stress. Our simulations for columnar grain microstructures with a grain diameter, d, of up to 70 nm reveal that the magnitude of rsplit relative to d represents a critical length scale controlling the low-temperature mechanical behavior of nanocrystalline materials. For rsplit>d, the first partials nucleated from the bou…
How to define variation of physical properties normal to an undulating one-dimensional object.
2009
One-dimensional flexible objects are abundant in physics, from polymers to vortex lines to defect lines and many more. These objects structure their environment and it is natural to assume that the influence these objects exert on their environment depends on the distance from the line-object. But how should this be defined? We argue here that there is an intrinsic length scale along the undulating line that is a measure of its "stiffness" (i.e., orientational persistence), which yields a natural way of defining the variation of physical properties normal to the undulating line. We exemplify how this normal variation can be determined from a computer simulation for the case of a so-called b…
Junction Dynamics in Telechelic Hydrogen Bonded Polyisobutylene Networks
1996
4-Urazoylbenzoic acid groups are attached to the chain ends of polyisobutylene. The cooperative assembling process of these polar groups is studied by DSC and dielectric and dynamic mechanical spectroscopy. The melting of the ordered clusters occurs in the temperature range 380-390 K. Distortions within the U4A clusters (Σ process) are monitored below the melting temperature T m with dielectric spectroscopy. On a larger length scale, these distortions also lead to stress relaxation which can be probed by dynamic mechanical measurements. Near T m , the relaxation ofU4A multiplets (α* relaxation) is detected with dielectric spectroscopy. In this temperature range, dynamic mechanical measureme…