Polymer Brushes in a Poor Solvent

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
The structure of an end-grafted polymer layer immersed in poor solvent is investigated through Monte Carlo simulation based on Edward's Hamiltonian. When the solvent quality becomes sufficiently poor, lateral inhomogeneities are observed to develop in the monomer density in the direction parallel to the grafting plane. A micro-phase-separated conformation is observed at long times. The length scale characteristic of the micro-phase structure is found to be consistent with a two-dimensional random walk. The simulation gives results consistent with the stability line predicted by Yeung, Balazs and Jasnow (Macromolecules, 26 (1993) 1914).