The behavior of miscible polymer mixtures at surfaces depends to a large extent on the thermodynamics of mixing in the bulk. The relative importance of bulk and surface interactions has been investigated for polymer blends and solutions using neutron reflection. Segregation in miscible blends of SAN copolymers is driven by surface tension differences between the two components, which arise from AN content differences. The extent of demixing at the surface is found to depend strongly on the Flory-Huggins interaction parameter, $\chi.$ For dilute solutions of terminally carboxylated polystyrenes in contact with an SiO$\sb2$ wall, polymer adsorption is dominated by the SiO$\sb2$/COOH interaction. Even under these "strong wall" conditions, the extent of adsorption is found to be sensitive to $\chi.$
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UMASS/oai:scholarworks.umass.edu:dissertations-8767 |
| Date | 01 January 1993 |
| Creators | Mansfield, Todd L |
| Publisher | ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst |
| Source Sets | University of Massachusetts, Amherst |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Source | Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest |
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