Abstract
A scaling model is presented to analyze the nonlinear rheology of unentangled polymer melts filled with high concentration of small spherical particles. Assuming the majority of chains to be reversibly adsorbed to the surface of the particles, we show that the emergence of nonlinearity in the viscoelastic response of the composite system subjected to a 2D shear flow results from stretching of the adsorbed chains and increasing desorption rate of the adsorbed segments due to the imposed deformation. The steady-state shear viscosity of the mixture in nonlinear shear thinning regime follows the power lawwhereis the applied shear rate. At large strain amplitude γ 0, the storage and loss moduli in strain sweep tests scale asandrespectively.
Highlights
Stable dispersion of sub-micron solid particles in polymer melts and solutions can be achieved in the presence of favorable polymer–particle interactions
Studying the rheological behavior of polymer composites reinforced with well-dispersed nanoparticles, often referred to as polymer nanocomposites (PNCs), has been the subject of a growing number of experimental and theoretical studies in the past decade [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]
This similarity implies that the adsorption of polymer chains on the surface of nanoparticles alters the mobility of the chains far into the bulk, and the mixture cannot be envisioned as a dispersion of hard particles interacting in a matrix
Summary
Stable dispersion of sub-micron solid particles in polymer melts and solutions can be achieved in the presence of favorable polymer–particle interactions. In the present Letter, we use a scaling model to elucidate the nonlinear rheological features of the nanofilled unentangled polymer melts by considering the effect of energetic affinities between polymer and particles.
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