ISSN print edition: 0366-6352 ISSN electronic edition: 1336-9075 Registr. No.: MK SR 9/7 Published monthly

Secondary self-assembly behaviors of PEO-b-PtBA-b-PS triblock terpolymers in solution

Arzugul Muslim, Zixin Zhao, Yi Shi, and Dilnur Malik

School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xinjiang Normal University, Urumqi, China

E-mail: pkudilnur@sina.com

Abstract: A series of PEO₄₅-b-PtBA₅₃-b-PS_x (x = 42, 84, 165) triblock terpolymers were synthesized by the atom transfer radical polymerization and characterized by size exclusion chromatography and ¹H NMR. Their self-assemblies were conducted by a two-step hierarchical self-assembly method and a one-step dialysis method and the self-assembly behaviors were investigated. The morphologies, sizes, and size distributions of micelles produced by the self-assembly were determined by transmission electron microscopy and dynamic light scattering. The secondary self-assembled structure of PEO₄₅-b-PtBA₅₃-b-PS_x obtained by the two-step hierarchical self-assembly could be controlled by tuning the length of PS block, the core forming block. The micelles were uniform with diameters of 20–25 nm and their size distributions, except for that of PEO₄₅-b-PtBA₅₃-b-PS₁₆₅, were narrow with particle size distribution indexes ranging from 0.014 to 0.246. The one-step dialysis of the triblock terpolymers produced vesicular micelles with distinct vesicle walls that exhibited similar thicknesses. The vesicles did not show significant aggregation. The size distribution of PEO₄₅-b-PtBA₅₃-b-PS₄₂ vesicle was the narrowest with a particle size distribution index value of 0.135. The PEO₄₅-b-PtBA₅₃-b-PS₁₆₅ vesicles tended to overlap with each other.

Keywords: Triblock terpolymers; PEO-b-PtBA-b-PS; Hierarchical self-assembly; Block length

Full paper is available at www.springerlink.com.

DOI: 10.1007/s11696-017-0159-y

Chemical Papers 71 (9) 1721–1729 (2017)