EXPERIMENTS ON ASSOCIATION OF BLOCK COPOLYMERS IN SOLUTION

Block copolymers in dilute and semidilute solutions in selective solvents self-associate forming multimolecular spherical micelles, cores of which are formed by insoluble blocks and shells by soluble blocks. In this paper experimental approaches are surveyed concerning structure and hydrodynamic properties of block copolymer micelles, thermodynamics of micelle formation, kinetics of micelle formation and dissociation, and dynamics of micellar equilibria. Some problems of present interest are briefly mentioned, like anomalous micellization or "tentacled" micelles.