Structural color of polymeric physical gels

Abstract

In this study, the coloration mechanism of isotactic poly(1-butene) (iPB) in o-xylene and o-xylene/ethyl alcohol mixture gels were carried out. iPB gel becomes yellow because of transmitted light or blue because of reflected light. Changing the temperature, solvent composition, or even the thickness of samples of this gel continuously changes its color to blue, violet, purple, red, and yellow. Structural characterization, electron microscopy, and transmittance measurements were carried out for iPB dissolved in o-xylene to form a three-dimensional sponge-like network with different mesh sizes under various conditions. Subsequently, the relative refractive index between the solvent and gel network produces incoherent Tyndall blue scattering. Finally, color change due to variations in solvent composition or temperature contributes to the interplay between the refractive index of network structure nnetwork and solvent ns. For a Tyndall medium with ns/nnetwork >1, normal reflection creates a blue gel; when ns/nnetwork ≒1, strong transmittance of light passing through the medium leads to a yellowish gel. This is the first report on the concept of structural color for polymeric physical gel systems.