Synthesis and characterization of nanostructured-segmented block copolyetheramide based on nylon6 and poly(ethylene oxide)

Abstract

Segmented block copolymer based on nylon6 (N6) and polyethylene oxide (PEO) with stochiometric ratio was synthesized via a two-step process. The first step represents end capping of N6 in the presence of adipic acid leading to carboxy terminated N6, and the second one is polycondensation of the latter product with PEO in the presence of catalyst and thermostabilizer to form a high molecular weight multi-block copolymer. Several methods were applied to characterize the synthesized copolymer such as Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, proton nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, differential thermal analysis, differential scanning calorimetry, X-ray diffraction and atomic force microscopy. The obtained results confirmed the multi-block structure for copolymer with a very high degree of micro-phase separation. Atomic force microscopy micrographs indicated that the morphology was the dispersion of high stiffness nanostructured polyamide (PA) domains in the amorphous region of PEO matrix, which can be very important in their performance for membrane processes.