THE MICROSTRUCTURE OF BLOCK COPOLYMERS FORMED VIA IONIC INTERACTIONS

The morphology produced by solution cast mixtures of telechelic polymers end capped with tertiary amine functionalities with telechelic polymers terminated with either sulfonate or carboxylate moieties closely resembles that seen in block copolymers formed by covalent bonding of two dissimilar chain segments. It has been found by temperature-dependent small-angle X-ray scattering and optical microscopic studies that the sulfonate/tertiary amine associations are more stable at elevated temperatures than the carboxylate analogs. These effective block copolymers undergo a classic order/disorder transition at elevated temperatures similar to that seen in covalently bonded block copolymers.