Polystyrene rheological studies

Rheological Studies of Aqueous Concentrated Polystyrene Latex Dispersions with Adsorbed Poly(vinyl alcohol) Layers... 

In this paper we report some rheological studies of aqueous concentrated polystyrene latex dispersions, in the presence of physically adsorbed poly(vinyl alcohol). This system has been chosen in view of its relevance to many practical systems and since many of the parameters needed for interpretation of the rheological results are available (15-18). The viscoelastic properties of a 20% w/w latex dispersion were investigated as a function of polymer coverage, using creep measurements. 

SAXS and Rheological Studies on the Order-Disorder and Order-Order Transitions in Mixtures of Polystyrene>6>Polyisoprene>6> Polystyrene and Low Molecular Weight PS... 

Rheological studies of sterically stabilised concentrated polystyrene latex dispersions under conditions of incipient flocculation... 

Styrene polymerizes spontaneously on heating, but samples for use in research are made by anionic polymerization. Of particular interest are structures having well-defined branching structures [28-31]. Several rheological studies of branched polystyrenes are discussed in later chapters. 

Polystyrene is an important commercial thermoplastic that has been described by Priddy [121]. Its entanglement molecular weight is aroimd 18,000 and for both structure-rheology studies and commercial applications, molecular weights much higher than this are of primary interest. Nearly all commercial polystyrene is atactic and is thus a transparent glass at temperatures below its Tg, which is 100 °C. New catalyst systems are able to produce isotactic and syndiotactic versions, but these have not found practical applications to date due to their brittleness. 

Any fundamental study of the rheology of concentrated suspensions necessitates the use of simple systems of well-defined geometry and where the surface characteristics of the particles are well established. For that purpose well-characterized polymer particles of narrow size distribution are used in aqueous or non-aqueous systems. For interpretation of the rheological results, the inter-particle pair-potential must be well-defined and theories must be available for its calculation. The simplest system to consider is that where the pair potential may be represented by a hard sphere model. This, for example, is the case for polystyrene latex dispersions in organic solvents such as benzyl alcohol or cresol, whereby electrostatic interactions are well screened (1). Concentrated dispersions in non-polar media in which the particles are stabilized by a "built-in" stabilizer layer, may also be used, since the pair-potential can be represented by a hard-sphere interaction, where the hard sphere radius is given by the particles radius plus the adsorbed layer thickness. Systems of this type have been recently studied by Croucher and coworkers. (10,11) and Strivens (12). 

The systems selected for evaluation are the PDMS-C02 system studied by Gerhardt et al. (1997, 1998) and PS-gas systems studied by Kwag et al. (1999). Properties for these systems are listed in Table 11.1. The variation in physical properties between these systems provides a very broad basis for evaluating the rheological properties of polymer-gas systems. The PDMS C02 system exhibits a favorable thermodynamic affinity between the polymer and dissolved gas, and provides the opportunity to evaluate the rheology of melts with very high dissolved gas content (up to 21 wt %). Carbon dioxide is much less soluble in polystyrene than in PDMS, so the PS-C02... 

These experimental mixers enabled the study of the role of the rheological properties of the individual blend components on the mechanisms and rates of dispersive mixing. Three commercial polymers Dow Chemical Company polystyrene (PS686) and low density polyethylene (PE 132) and Chevron low density polyethylene (PE 1409) were used in the study. Figure 11.32 (a) shows the viscosities of the three polymers at 200°C (121). PS 685... 

Anionic polymerization, however, can be used to produce high molecular weight narrow distribution polystyrene. If all the chains are initiated at the same time and the temperature is kept low to minimize chain transfer, molecular weight distributions very close to monodisperse can be produced. The commercial uses of these polymers seem to be limited to instrument calibrations and laboratory studies of the effects of molecular weight on rheology and physical properties. However, anionic polymerization as a potential commercial method for producing polystyrene has been extensively studied by Dow and others. The potential for high polymerization rates, complete conversion of... 

Unlike radical polymerization, branched polystyrenes having a variety of controlled structures have been synthesized (Figure 24.10). This is because termination can be precisely controlled. The branched polystyrenes synthesized using anionic chemistry have been used to study the effect of branch structure on rheology [15]. As will be discussed in the next section, branch architecture (like those presented in Figure 24.10) can influence the rheological properties of polystyrene resins. 

In a later study, Roovers and Graessley [39] investigated the role that molecular weight between branches plays in the rheology of polystyrene combs. Two backbone polymers with molecular weights of 275000 and 860 000 g/mol... 

Very few studies have been performed investigating the effect of branching on the extensional rheological properties of polystyrenes. Such investigations can be valuable because many of the fabrication operations associated with commercial applications of polystyrene include operations in which the polystyrene melt undergoes an extensional deformation. Some examples are extruded foam sheet, blown film, oriented (tentered) sheet, and thermoforming. The types of deformations associated with these processing operations are best described as... 

Let us discuss the results of studies [13, 16-21], obtained through studying isothermal flows of keroplasts. In compliance with the above-mentioned facts these results can be applied to the description of the rheologic behaviour of compositional polymer materials with various disperse inert fillers. At displacement speeds corresponding to the speeds realized under the conditions of processing thermoplastic compositions, the Newton flow area was obtained on the flow curves (FC) of sevilene-based keroplasts but not with other keroplasts (polyethylene and polystyrene-based). 

To separately study the influence of rheological properties on the length of filling, the authors of the quoted works initially studied kerogene-90-filled PS keroplasts. As demonstrated in Tabled, in this case, thermophysical characteristics of the composition are similar to those of basic polystyrene. The result in this cas was simple, as expected ... 

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