REACTIVE DEPENDENT GROWTH KINETICS AND MORPHOLOGY OF A-B-COPOLYMER TERNARY MIXTURES

Abstract

In this paper, we present Monte Carlo simulations of A-B-diblock-copolymer ternary mixtures simultaneously undergoing phase separation and reversible chemical reaction A + B ⇌ C . The results demonstrate that the competition of chemical reaction and thermal diffusion dynamics co-determine the self-assembling morphology and growth kinetics of the reactive ternary mixtures. The role of the chemical reaction on the growth kinetics count mainly on the copolymer–polymer interaction strength Jp. If Jp < 1.0, the introduction of chemical reaction speeds up the domain growth; while for Jp > 1.0, the chemical reaction slows down the domain growth. The domain growth exponent decreases linearly with increasing of the copolymer–polymer interaction strength. At a later stage, 〈1, 0〉 and 〈0, 1〉 oriented strip pattern formations are observed when Jp is strong.