Abstract
The compatibilizer with double comb structure has a superior compatibilizing effect for immiscible polymer blends due to the symmetrical structure on both sides of main chains. Extensive study related to the architectural effects of compatibilizer on the compatibilization has mainly focused on the side chains. We investigated the influence of the compatibilizer-main-chain structure on the compatibilizing effect for immiscible poly(vinylidene fluoride)/poly(L-lactic acid) (PVDF/PLLA) blends. Two reactive-comb compatibilizers with polystyrene (PS) and polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) as main chains and PMMA as the side chains have been synthesized. PS is immiscible with both PLLA and PVDF, while PMMA is miscible with PVDF. It was found that both compatibilizers can improve the compatibility between the PLLA and PVDF, with different compatibilization effects. In the PVDF/PLLA (50/50) blends, 1 wt.% poly(styrene-co-glycidyl methacrylate)-graft-poly(methyl methacrylate) (RC–SG) tuned the morphology from the droplet-in-matrix structure to the co-continuous structure, while the blends with poly(methyl methacrylate-co-glycidyl methacrylate)-graft-poly(methyl methacrylate) (RC–MMG) kept the sea-island structure with even 3 wt.% loading. Moreover, RC–SG induces a wider co-continuous interval range than RC–MMG. The co-continuous structure obtained by RC–SG was also more stable than that by RC–MMG. It was further found that RC–SG-compatibilized PVDF/PLLA blends exhibit higher mechanical properties than the RC–MMG-compatibilized blends.
Highlights
Polymer blending has become an important way to prepare new high-performance polymeric materials over the past 40 years [1,2,3,4,5]
For the pure PVDF/PLLA (50/50) blend, PVDF forms domains that disperse in the PLLA matrix (Figure 1a) due to the much higher melt viscosity and density of PVDF than of PLLA
Some clear gaps were observed at the PVDF–PLLA interface for their weak interfacial adhesion
Summary
Polymer blending has become an important way to prepare new high-performance polymeric materials over the past 40 years [1,2,3,4,5]. Most commercial polymer blends are immiscible because of their high molecular weights and unfavorable interactions, and, form multiphase structures [6,7,8]. The double-grafted side chains of the compatibilizers can stabilize the dynamic balance of the neighboring phases at the interface [13,14,15,16]. This technique is based on the in-situ formation of double-grafted copolymers at polymer–polymer interface, which substantially lowers interface tension, suppresses particle coalescence, and exhibits enhanced physical properties [17,18,19,20]
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