Logo image
Using External Fields to Control the Location of Nanoparticles in Polymers: Simulations and Experiments
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Using External Fields to Control the Location of Nanoparticles in Polymers: Simulations and Experiments

Vibha Kalra and Yong Lak Joo
The XVth International Congress on Rheology Part One (AIP Conference Proceedings Volume 1027, Part 1), v 1027, pp 534-536
03 Aug 2008

Abstract

We present experiments and simulations of polymer nanocomposites to understand the effect of deformation on dispersion of self-attracting nanoparticles. First, electrospinning is used to fabricate poly(styrene-b-isoprene) nanofibers where magnetite nanoparticles are uniformly dispersed only in one of the domains. Then we model and simulate nanocomposites of homopolymers and block copolymers where the particle-particle attractions greatly exceed that of particle-polymer using molecular dynamics to quantify the effects of shear flow. Our results reveal that deformation can play a critical role in controlling the location of nanoparticles and obtaining a uniform dispersion.

Metrics

9 Record Views
3 citations in Scopus

Details

Logo image