Ternary Microphase Diagram of <scp>SBM</scp> Triblock Terpolymer Morphologies in Spherical Confinement
ABSTRACT Block copolymers are a versatile class of soft materials, as they combine different chemical and physical properties within the same macromolecule. Triblock terpolymers are of particular interest because of the numerous morphologies they can form. With the aim of generating a comprehensive ternary microphase diagram, we emulsified 22 different polystyrene‐ block ‐polybutadiene‐ block ‐poly(methyl methacrylate) triblock terpolymers and analyzed the morphology of the resulting microparticles after solvent evaporation. We employed controlled confinement conditions using a Shirasu Porous Glass membrane setup and analyzed the microparticles via transmission electron microscopy and tomography, as well as scanning electron microscopy. We identified a wealth of microparticle morphologies, of which several were previously not reported. Experiments were accompanied by coarse‐grained molecular simulations, where we correlated the effect of evaporation rate on morphology and particle shape.
Authors
- Elias M. Zirdehi
- Manuel Trömer (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0005-2365-8424)
- Arash Nikoubashman (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0563-825X)
- André H. Gröschel (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2576-394X)
- Yorick Post (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2628-2064)
Institutions
- Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (DE)
- University of Münster (DE)
- Leibniz Institute of Polymer Research (DE)
- Bavarian Polymer Institute (DE)
- University of Bayreuth (DE)
- Technische Universität Dresden (DE)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Journal of Polymer Science
- Published
- 2025-05-23
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1002/pol.20250090
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Advanced Polymer Synthesis and Characterization
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.94
Funders
- Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
- Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster