Fabrication of honeycomb-patterned film using hyperbranched polyethylene-based copolymer

Abstract

Branched polymers were considered as one of the ideal materials to prepare patterned honeycomb film because of their strong ability to stabilize water droplets. In this work, we reported the first example of preparing patterned honeycomb films via breath figure method using hyperbranched polyethylene-based copolymer (HBPE-g-PtBMA). A systematic research was conducted to study the effect of solution concentration, relative humidity and substrate on the micro-structure of HBPE-g-PtBMA honeycomb film. It was found that the pore diameter (varied from 1.25 to 2.18μm) and pore height (varied from 61 to 820nm) could be controlled by adjusting solution concentration and relative humidity respectively. Besides, we verified that substrate with lower heat conductivity contributed to the formation of more regular honeycomb films. This work paved the way of fabricating patterned honeycomb films employing other hyperbranched polyethylene-based polymers and pointed to a new direction for the development of next-generation honeycomb patterned materials.