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Enhancement of the Photoalignment Stability of Block Copolymer Brushes by Anchor Segments
Author(s) -
Cai Feng,
Huang Zhangjun,
Zheng Feng,
Lu Xuemin,
Lu Qinghua
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
macromolecular chemistry and physics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.57
H-Index - 112
eISSN - 1521-3935
pISSN - 1022-1352
DOI - 10.1002/macp.201800153
Subject(s) - copolymer , materials science , azobenzene , substrate (aquarium) , polymer brush , polymer chemistry , moiety , polymer , methacrylate , chemical engineering , composite material , polymerization , chemistry , organic chemistry , oceanography , engineering , geology
Abstract It is known that the use of a homopolymer derived from a relatively high‐surface‐energy block moiety in a diblock copolymer as a substrate can facilitate phase separation of the block copolymer in the form of a layered structure parallel to the substrate. This is an effective approach for preparing a photoresponsive surface molecular brush for liquid‐crystal alignment. However, the alignment of the polymer brushes soon diminishes during elastic deformation of the polymeric substrate due to the weak interaction between the copolymer and polymeric substrate in the interfacial blend layer. In this study, rigid segments composed of N ‐ p ‐anisylmaleimide were controllably introduced via copolymerization into a series of well‐defined diblock copolymers as “anchors” to resist the “drift” of the copolymer from a polymethyl methacrylate substrate at above its glass transition temperature. The anchoring mechanism and the stability of the aligned azobenzene polymeric brushes were systematically studied and compared.