Water-dispersible porous polyisoprene-block-poly(acrylic acid) microspheres

✍ Scribed by Zhihua Lu; Guojun Liu; Futian Liu

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2003
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 338 KB
• Volume: 90
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0021-8995
• DOI: 10.1002/app.12935

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

Two polyisoprene‐block‐poly(tert‐butyl acrylate) (PI‐b‐P__t__BA) samples and a poly(tert‐butyl acrylate) (P__t__BA) homopolymer (hP__t__BA) were prepared by anionic polymerization and characterized by light scattering, size exclusion chromatography, and NMR. The tert‐butyl groups were removed from one of the diblocks to yield amphiphilic polyisoprene‐block‐poly(acrylic acid) (PI‐b‐PAA). PI‐b‐PAA was then used as the surfactant to disperse dichloromethane containing PI‐b‐P__t__BA and hP__t__BA at different weight ratios as oil droplets in water. Solid microspheres containing segregated polyisoprene (PI) and P__t__BA/hP__t__BA domains were obtained after dichloromethane evaporation. Permanent microspheres were obtained after PI domain crosslinking with sulfur monochloride. Porous microspheres were produced after the hydrolysis of P__t__BA and the extraction of the homopoly(acrylic acid) chains. The shape and connectivity of the poly(acrylic acid)‐lined pores were tuned by changes in the P__t__BA/hP__t__BA content in the precursor microspheres. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 90: 2785–2793, 2003