Microphase separation in binary polymeric micelles

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Abstract
A theoretical analysis of microphase separation in binary micelles is presented. We consider micelles consisting of two kinds of diblock copolymers such that the micellar corona contains two chemically distinct block types (A and B). Both intramicellar and intermicellar processes may occur. We focus on intermicellar segregation occurring after a quench yielding complete intramicellar microphase separation. The intermicellar process, made possible by the associative nature of the micelles, is driven by line tension. This rather special driving force owes its importance to the enormously long phase boundary in the system. For micelles with relatively thin coronas, the final distribution of micellar composition is proportional to exp [- Γx — κN 1/3N14/27cx½(1— x ) ½] where x is the fraction of A blocks in the corona, N and Nc are the degrees of polymerization of the coronal and the core blocks, Γ and κ are numerical constants