Chapter 5 - Compatibilization of polymer blends by the addition of random copolymers

Abstract

For an immiscible blend system, the drop coalescence usually occurs, which leads to macroscopic phase separation and a severe deterioration in properties. Random copolymers are proven effective in suppressing drop coalescence and increasing compatibility of immiscible polymers. This chapter addresses the aspects related to the thermodynamics in polymer blends with a random copolymer as a compatibilizer, and the progress of compatibilization of binary and multicomponent immiscible systems. The first part gives a theoretical description of adding a random copolymer to binary mixture of homopolymers. The second part deals with the progress of compatibilization of binary blends with a random copolymer including main chain random copolymer and melt-grafted copolymer. And the effects of random copolymers on the interfacial properties and morphology of binary blends are discussed in detail. The third part focuses on compatibilization strategies for multicomponent immiscible blends by well-designed melt-grafted copolymers. In both part 2 and part 3, the correspondence between structure and performance of polymer blends is placed in an important position which should receive much attention.