Polymers, Volume 9, Issue 2

To design the properties of a copolymer using free radical polymerization, a semicontinuous process can be applied to vary the instantaneous copolymer composition along the conversion searching for a specific composition spectrum of copolymer chains,...

The most time-consuming phase of the injection molding cycle is cooling. Cooling efficiency can be enhanced with the application of conformal cooling systems or high thermal conductivity copper molds. The conformal cooling channels are placed along t...

The bond behaviour of novel, sand-coated ultra-high modulus (UHM) carbon fibre reinforced polymers (CFRP) tendons to high performance concrete (HPC) was studied by a combined numerical and experimental approach. A series of pull-out tests revealed th...

Recent progress in single-molecule manipulation technologies has made it possible to exert force and torque on individual DNA biopolymers to probe their mechanical stability and interaction with various DNA-binding proteins. It was revealed in these...

Electrospinning is a versatile process technology, exploited for the production of fibers with varying diameters, ranging from nano- to micro-scale, particularly useful for a wide range of applications. Among these, tissue engineering is particularly...

The conformation of polymer chains under confinement is investigated in intercalated polymer/layered silicate nanocomposites. Hydrophilic poly(ethylene oxide)/sodium montmorillonite, PEO/Na⁺-MMT, hybrids were prepared utilizing melt intercalation wit...

Butyl rubber (isobutylene–isoprene–rubber, IIR) was functionalized in solution with a nitroxide moiety taking advantage of the unsaturations present in the isoprene units of IIR, and was further grafted with maleic anhydride (MA) or styrene–MA (SMA)...

There has been a rapid growth in research and innovation of bio-based adhesives in the engineered wood product industry. This article reviews the recent research published over the last few decades on the synthesis of bio-adhesives derived from such...

The influence of the solvent nature on optical properties of poly[2-methoxy-5-3,7-dimethyloctyloxy-1,4-phenylenevinylene] (MDMO-PPV)/Coumarine 500 (C500) have been investigated. In addition, the amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) from MDMO-PPV and...

Developing sustainable, low viscous and efficient solvents are always advantageous to the processing/fabricating of cellulose materials in practical applications. To this end, in this work novel solvents were developed; ([Amim][CH₃COO]/PEG) by dissol...

Characterization of responsive hydrogels and their interaction with other molecules have significantly expanded our understanding of the functional materials. We here report on the response of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide-co-acrylic acid) (pNIPAm-co-AA...

Polyurethanes (PU) are widely used synthetic polymers. The growing amount of PU used industrially has resulted in a worldwide increase of plastic wastes. The related environmental pollution as well as the limited availability of the raw materials bas...

Conjugated polymers containing boron and gallium diiminate complexes were prepared with various electron-donating comonomers via pre- and post-complexation methods, respectively. From a comparison of emission quantum yields between solution and film...

Carbon dots (CDs) have been widely studied since their discovery in 2004 as a green substitute of the traditional quantum dots due to their excellent photoluminescence (PL) and high biocompatibility. Meanwhile, polymers have increasingly become an im...

Recently, new methods have been developed for the utilization of elemental sulfur as a feedstock for novel polymeric materials. One promising method is the inverse vulcanization, which is used to prepare polymeric structures derived from sulfur and d...

A unique biodegradable, superporous, swellable and pH sensitive nanocellulose reinforced chitosan hydrogel with dynamic mechanical properties was prepared for oral administration of curcumin. Curcumin, a less water-soluble drug was used due to the fa...

PolyCarboxylate ether-based superplasticizers (PCEs) are a type of comb-shaped copolymers used as polymeric dispersants in cementitious materials. PCEs have a high degree of dispersity, which limits the suitability of conventional characterization te...

In order to obtain a wide-range magnetoelectric (ME) response on a ME nanocomposite that matches industry requirements, Tb0.3Dy0.7Fe1.92 (Terfenol-D)/CoFe₂O₄/P(VDF-TrFE) flexible films were produced by the solvent casting technique and their morpholo...

The structural properties of novel melt-spun polymer optical fibers (POFs) are investigated by small-angle X-ray scattering. The amorphous PMMA POFs were subjected to a rapid cooling in a water quench right after extrusion in order to obtain a radial...

In this study, polyelectrolyte multilayers were fabricated on a polystyrene (PS) plate using a Layer-by-Layer (LbL) self-assembly technique. The resulting functional platform showed improved performance compared with conventional enzyme-linked immuno...

Surface-initiated atom transfer radical polymerization (SI-ATRP) is one of the most versatile techniques to modify the surface properties of materials. Recent developed metal-free SI-ATRP makes such techniques more widely applicable. Herein photo-ind...

Knots can occur in biopolymers such as DNA and peptides. In our previous study, we systematically investigated the effects of intra-chain interactions on knots and found that long-range repulsions can surprisingly tighten knots. Here, we use this kno...

Two knots on a string can either be separated or intertwined, and may even pass through each other. At the microscopic scale, such transitions may occur spontaneously, driven by thermal fluctuations, and can be associated with a topological free ener...

The dielectric and magnetic behaviour and thermal properties of composites based on nickel–zinc ferrite (NZF) filler can be improved by the addition of various types of materials. Amongst others, ferrite–polymer composites have been subjected to a wi...

Restenosis at a vascular anastomosis site is a major cause of graft failure and is difficult to prevent by conventional treatment. Perivascular drug delivery has advantages as drugs can be diffused to tunica media and subintima while minimizing the d...

Dnsity functional theory (DFT) calculations have been carried out for the highly selective cis-1,4-polymerization of butadiene catalyzed by a cationic rare-earth metal complex bearing an ancillary PNP ligand. It has been found that the chain initiati...

We briefly review the recent developments in the theory of individual semiflexible filaments, and of a crosslinked network of such filaments, both permanent and transient. Starting from the free energy of an individual semiflexible chain, models on i...

This paper presents a theoretical formalism for describing systems of semiflexible polymers, which can have density variations due to finite compressibility and exhibit an isotropic-nematic transition. The molecular architecture of the semiflexible p...

The interactions between model polyanions and polycations have been studied using frontal continuous capillary electrophoresis (FACCE) which allows the determination of binding stoichiometry and binding constant of the formed polyelectrolyte complex...

Diblock copolymers consisting of a hydrophilic poly(2-(methacryloyloxy)ethyl phosphorylcholine) (PMPC) block and either a cationic or anionic block were prepared from (3-(methacrylamido)propyl)trimethylammonium chloride (MAPTAC) or sodium 2-(acrylami...

Fibers spun by melt spinning of binary and ternary polypropylene/polyethylenetherephthalate blends have been produced and characterized in order to investigate the effect of a compatibilizer on their morphology and mechanical properties. The compatib...

The mechanisms for the base-catalyzed condensation reactions in phenol-formaldehyde resin synthesis were investigated by using the density functional theory method. The structures of the intermediates and transition states, as well as the potential e...

Organosolv lignins obtained from sugar maple bark and wood were studied as adhesives for wood particleboard production. Organosolv pulping of sugar maple wood and bark was carried out in the presence of Lewis acid FeCl₃ as a catalyst. The organosolv...

Engineering cell surfaces with natural or synthetic materials is a unique and powerful strategy for biomedical applications. Cells exhibit more sophisticated migration, control, and functional capabilities compared to nanoparticles, scaffolds, viruse...

RAFT polymerization is attractive for its reliability, facile operation, and high tolerance to a wide variety of monomers, functional groups, solvents, and temperatures. Herein, we report the RAFT-based synthesis of well-defined polymers bearing hydr...

Ammoxidation of pine kraft lignin in aqueous 5 wt % ammonia affords a novel type of phenol substitute that significantly accelerates resole synthesis and curing as demonstrated for 40 wt % phenol replacement. Compared to non-ammoxidized lignin, which...

There have been exciting developments in the field of polymer solar cells (PSCs) as the potential competitor to the traditional silicon-based solar cells in the past decades. The most successful PSCs are based on the bulk hetero-junction (BHJ) struct...

The crystallization behavior of poly(ε-caprolactone) (PCL) in a poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF)/PCL blend as well as on a highly orientated PVDF substrate was studied by means of POM, DSC and TEM. The results show that the miscibility of the PVDF/PC...

Hydrophylic fumed silica AR974 was tested as a potential nanofiller for the production of composite isotactic polypropylene filaments/fibers (containing 0.25–2 vol % of nanoparticles) via melt compounding and subsequent hot drawing. The objectives of...

A novel flexible nanocomposite pressure sensor with a tensile strength of about 47 MPa is fabricated in this work. Nanolayers of titanium dioxide (titania nanolayers, TNL) synthesized by hydrothermal method are used to reinforce the polyvinylidene fl...

Bulk heterojunction solar cells based on blends of quantum dots and conjugated polymers are a promising configuration for obtaining high-efficiency, cheaply fabricated solution-processed photovoltaic devices. Such devices are of significant interest...

Waveguides made of poly-methyl-methacrylate (PMMA) play a major role in the homogeneous distribution of display backlights as a matrix for solid-state dye lasers and polymer optical fibers (POFs). PMMA is favored because of its transparency in the vi...

As environmentally friendly and degradable material, Poly(lactic acid) (PLA) ultrafine fibers are promising candidates for the removal of oil from water. In this work, a self-established needleless melt-electrospinning process was used to produce PLA...

The development of new antifouling paints requires understanding the parameters involved in antifouling activity and to develop new analytical tools for their evaluation. A series of biodegradable poly(ε-caprolactone-co-δ-valerolactone) copolymers va...

Local stiffness of polymer chains is instrumental in all structure formation processes of polymers, from crystallization of synthetic polymers to protein folding and DNA compactification. We present Stochastic Approximation Monte Carlo simulations—a...

Reaction of a condensed flavonoid tannin, namely mimosa tannin extract with a hexamethylene diamine, has been investigated. For that purpose, catechin was also used as a flavonoid model compound and treated in similar conditions. Solid-state cross-po...