Polymer blends toughness

For substrates of WORM and EOD(PCR) disks the industry in the future wants polymers that have a markedly improved resistance to heat softening compared to BPA-PC and, if possible, a lower water absorption and lower birefringence, but otherwise maintain the good characteristics in toughness, production, and cost (194). This goal is being approached in different ways further modification of BPA-PC, newly developed polymers, improvement of the processing characteristics of uv-curable cross-linked polymers, and development of special copolymers and polymer blends, eg,... 

Liu, Y. H., and Zumbrunnen, D. A., Toughness enhancement in polymer blends due to the in-situ formation by chaotic mixing of fine-scale extended structures, J. Mater. Sci. 34, 1921-1931 (1999). 

The properties of immiscible polymers blends are strongly dependent on the morphology of the blend, with optimal mechanical properties only being obtained at a critical particle size for the dispersed phase. As the size of the dispersed phase is directly proportional to the interfacial tension between the components of the blend, there is much interest in interfacial tension modification. Copolymers, either preformed or formed in situ, can localize at the interface and effectively modify the interfacial tension of polymer blends. The incorporation of PDMS phases is desirable as a method to improve properties such as impact resistance, toughness, tensile strength, elongation at break, thermal stability and lubrication. 

The properties of block copolymers that are most affected by molecular architecture are elastomeric behavior, melt processability, and toughness in the solid state. The effects of such copolymers in polymer blends can obviously also be strongly influenced by the same factors. 

Raman spectroscopy is sensitive to polymer conformation. For example, a polymer blend of polybutadiene-polystyrene in which polybutadiene is used to increase toughness of the polystyrene can be examined by Raman microscopy to identify its heterogeneity. Polybutadiene has three isomer conformations (cis-1,4, trans-1,4 and syndiotactic-1,2). These three types of isomers can be identified from C=C stretching modes as shown in Figure 9.36. The Raman spectra of the copolymer indicate the difference in amounts of isomer types at the edge and the center of the polybutadiene-polystyrene sample. Relative amounts of these isomer types affect the mechanical properties of the copolymer. 

A group of new, fully miscible, polymer blends consisting of various styrene-maleic anhydride terpolymers blended with styrene-acrylonitrile copolymer and rubber-modified versions of these materials have been prepared and investigated. In particular the effects of chemical composition of the components on heat resistance and the miscibility behavior of the blends have been elucidated. Toughness and response to elevated temperature air aging are also examined. Appropriate combinations of the components may be melt blended to provide an enhanced balance of heat resistance, chemical resistance, and toughness. 

Enhancement of mechanical properties is of interest only if it is not accompanied by a loss of other important properties of the blend. Of particular concern for such polymer blends is stiffness, because most means of increasing impact strength also reduce stiffness (14-19). But this is not the case for the iPS-fc-iPP-iPS-iPP blends studied here as seen in Table II. It is clear that the enhancement in toughness just described is not accompanied by a loss of stiffness, but it is essentially unaffected by the compatibilizer. And the stiffness of iPS-fc-iPP-iPS-iPP is higher than that of iPP and HIPS. The impact-modulus behavior seems to be due to the tough (or rigid) characteristics, morphologies of phases, and semicrystalline isotactic structure of each block in the iPS-b-iPP diblock copolymer. 

Intense commercial and academic interest in block copolymers developed during the 1960s and continues today. These materials attract the attention of industry because of their potential for application as thermoplastic elastomers, tough plastics, compatibilizing agents for polymer blends, agents for surface and interface mo dification, polymer micelles, etc. Academic interest arises, primarily, from the use of these materials as model copolymer systems where effects of thermodynamic incompatibility of the two (or more) components on properties in bulk and solution can be probed. The synthesis, characterization, and properties of classical linear block copolymers (AB diblocks, ABA triblocks, and segmented (AB)n systems) have been well documented in a number of books and reviews [1-7] and will not be discussed herein except for the sake of comparison. 

Toughness is probably the most examined property for polymer blends. Impact resistance depends... 

Polymer blends can fill the cost-performance gaps in the existing commercial polymers. Several properties can be uniquely combined in a blend that a single resin often cannot provide. In some cases, synergistic improvements in properties such as toughness and heat resistance are achievable. 

The New Concept for Understanding the Brittle-to-tough Transition in Polymer Blends 624... 

In systems that are impact-modified systems, it could be observed that the critical volume concentration phenomenon also depends on the properties of the matrix polymer. Publications have shown that the size of the particles of the dispersed phase and the concentration at which the so called brittlc-to-tough transition occurs, arc influenced by many factors. It is therefore not surprising that topological theories in their present fonu, which do not take into account many of these factors, cannot give any help to predict the properties of unknown systems. Recently, a phase transition ( inversion ) in polymer blending has been experimentally observed [78],... 

THE NEW CONCEPT FOR UNDERSTANDING THE BRITTLE-TO-TOUGH TRANSITION IN POLYMER BLENDS... 

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