The superior material properties of polymer/clay nanocomposites have attracted much research interests in the past years. The hypothesis of polymer stiffening in the vicinity of the nano-c1ay described using the "core-shell" model has not been fully investigated yet. The investigation of the interfacial region by atomic force microscopy (AFM) has provided us with details of the physical state of this region. It was found that the polymer stiffening region could extend as far as 200nm and 100nm from the face and the edge of a nano-clay respectively. Two different degrees of polymer stiffening have been observed from AFM micrographs with the help of amplitude and phase contrasting techniques. The temperature dependant property of the stiffened polymer has been studied using a heating stage, which showed the stiffened polymer was softened with increasing temperature between the studied range, 60°C and 91°C. The relative polymer crystallinity derived from the X-ray diffraction (XRD) data showed a general trend that increases with the clay content, regardless of the clay modification. However, an exception has been observed with the set of bi-axially drawn specimens, of which the highest polymer crystallinity was found to be the neat polymer when compared with the nanocomposites counterpart. It is believed that the presence of nano-c1ay particles restricted the reorientation of the polymer chains upon stress. From the in situ isothermal investigation of polymer crystal growth, it has been found the crystal grown from a nano-clay particle is larger than that from the bulk. This indicated that the crystallisation began at a lower temperature. The nano-clay and polymer crystal orientations have been further studied with X-ray texture analysis. It was found that the polymer chains were not completely aligned alone the extrusion direction as expected. Also, from the annealed specimens it was found that the orientation of the nano-clay particles had been influenced by the relaxation of the polymer chains.

Les propriétés mécaniques des polymères et des copolymères à blocs ont été étudiées par simulation de type dynamique moléculaire (modèle billes-ressorts). Les échantillons polymères ont été générés par la méthode de « radical like polymerisation ». Ces échantillons ont été soumis à des essais de traction uniaxiaux et triaxiaux dans le but d’étudier leurs réponses mécaniques. Dans la première partie de ce travail on a comparé deux méthodes de traction : « méthode de traction homogène» et la traction « pilotée par les bords » de l’échantillon. Les résultats montrent que les deux méthodes sont équivalentes à faible vitesse de traction. Le changement de distance entre enchevêtrement dans un polymère modèle sous traction est analysé, les résultats montrent que le désenchevêtrèrent des chaines est plus prononcé lorsque la déformation de l’échantillon est uniaxiale du fait de la relaxation latérale de l’échantillon. La nucléation des cavités dans les polymères amorphes soumis à une déformation triaxial a été également étudiée. On a trouvé que les cavités se forment dans des zones qui sont caractérisées par un faible module d’incompressibilité élastique. Ces zones sont identifiables dès le début de la déformation à une température très basse (T~0K). La seconde partie de ce travail se concentre sur la simulation de la réponse mécanique des copolymères à blocs. L’influence de l’architecture moléculaire sur le comportement mécanique de l’échantillon a été analysée. Les résultats montrent que le comportement mécanique des échantillons est piloté par le taux des chaines liantes qui assurent la transmission des contraintes entre les phases. Le flambement des lamelles dans les copolymères à blocs a été également étudié, l’influence de la taille de l’échantillon et de la vitesse de déformation sur la réponse mécanique de l’échantillon a été explorée. Les résultats montrent un changement de mode du flambement selon la vitesse de déformation imposée. Un nouveau modèle qui prend en compte le facteur cinétique du flambement est proposé pour décrire la compétition entre les modes. / We use molecular dynamics simulation of a coarse grained model to investigate the mechanical properties of homogenous polymers and lamellar block copolymers. Polymer samples have been generated using “radical like polymerisation” method. These samples were submitted to uniaxial and triaxial tensile tests in order to study their mechanical responses. First we compare two tensile test methods: the “homogenous deformation method” and the “boundary driven deformation method”. We find that the two methods lead to similar results at low strain rate. The change of the entanglement network in polymer sample undergoing a tensile deformation was investigated. We have found that the sample exhibits an increase of its entanglement length in uniaxial deformation test compared to triaxial deformation one. Our finding was interpreted by the pronounced chain disentanglement observed in the uniaxial deformation test due to the lateral relaxation of the sample. The cavity nucleation in amorphous polymers has been also studied. We have found that the cavities nucleate preferentially in zones that exhibit a low elastic bulk modulus. These zones can be identified from the initial undeformed state of the sample at low temperature (T~0K). The second part of the work focused in the simulation of the mechanical response of block copolymers. The influence of chain architecture on the mechanical properties was investigated: our finding reveals an important role of the bridging molecules (cilia chains and knotted loop chains) on the stress transmission between phases at high strain. The initiation of plasticity in copolymer samples was also studied. The role of the buckling has been found to be determinant in the mechanical response of the sample The dependence of the buckling instability with the sample size and the deformation rate was investigated. We have found that the fundamental (first) mode of buckling develops at relatively low strain rate whereas at high strain rate the buckling of the sample occurs with the second or higher mode of buckling. A new model that takes into account the buckling kinetic was developed to describe this competition between the buckling modes.