Amphiphilic ABC Triblock Copolymers Tailored via RAFT Polymerization as Textile Surface Modifiers with Dual-Action Properties

Abstract

We present the synthesis and characterization of two different kinds of triblock copolymers prepared via RAFT polymerization by only two synthetic steps applying a sequential monomer addition approach. Both triblock copolymers consist of a hydrophilic, a hydrophobic and an anchor block which is located in the middle or at the end of the polymer chains. In both triblock copolymer systems the hydrophobic blocks consist of randomly polymerized tert-butylstyrene (tBS) and n-hexyl acrylate (nHA) monomers in a ratio of approximately 2:1, respectively, whereas the hydrophilic blocks were accomplished by polymerization of N,N-dimethylacrylamide (DMA). As a result of the employed synthetic approach, every anchor block contains several N-acryloxysuccinimide (NAS) units besides tBS and nHA units in the case of the triblock copolymer with the central anchor block and DMA units in the case of the triblock copolymer with the terminal anchor block. The structures as well as the compositions of all synthesized polymers w...