Rigid-chain polymers dynamics

Zhao Tongyang, and Wang Xiaogong. Phase behavior of lyotropic rigid-chain polymer liquid crystal studied by dissipative particle dynamics. J. Chem. Phys. 135 (2011) 244901. 

In terms of polymer dynamics the chains are very rigid, but defects can arise because the backbone does not adopt a low entropy all-ifum structure. Part of the... 

In practice, intermolecular nucleation could coexist with intramolecular nucleation. Intermolecular nucleation is often observed with short chains, rigid chains, or when chains are stretched. Recently, upon stretching network polymers, the transition from intramolecular nucleation to intermolecular nucleation was observed in dynamic Monte Carlo simulations [59]. By analyzing the probability of adjacent chain folding... 

These materials are introduced in Chapter 5 and only brief mention of them is necessary here. It is important to appreciate that polymer electrolytes, which consist of salts, e.g. Nal, dissolved in solid cation coordinating polymers, e.g. (CH2CH20) , conduct by quite a different mechanism from crystalline or glass electrolytes. Ion transport in polymers relies on the dynamics of the framework (i.e. the polymer chains) in contrast to hopping within a rigid framework. Intense efforts are being made to make use of these materials as electrolytes in all solid state lithium batteries for both microelectronic medical and vehicle traction applications. 

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