H-Bonded Liquid Crystalline Polymer Network Materials

Side-chain copolymers, poly(mOBA-co-mStilb)s, composed of proton acceptors (stilbazoles) and proton donors (benzoic acids) connected to polyacrylate backbone with different methylene spacer lengths (m = 6 and 10) were prepared in different donor/acceptor molar ratios. The H-bonded copolymeric networks were formed once they were synthesized, and showed more homogenous phase than the physical-blended supramolecular networks consisting of donor and acceptor homopolymers, i.e.H-bonded blends of PmOBA and PmStilb. In order to compare the effects of the backbone connection of these H-bonded copolymers and blends, we also built monomer-monomer and polymer-monomer H-bonded complexes of similar structures (shown in Fig. 1). DSC, POM, and powder XRD studies reveal that the copolymers (m = 10)with mole fractions of benzoic acids between 0.33-0.83 show the smectic A (SMA) phase with layer spacing values between 42.22A-50.47A (increases with higher H-bonded crosslinking density between benzoic acids and stilbazoles), while for m = 6, liquid crystalline behavior still can be observed at 0.89 molar fraction of benzoic acids. However, on the basis of powder XRD study it is found that the d spacing values of H-bonded copolymers with m = 6 in the SmA phase increase with higher molar ratios of benzoic acids, which is agreed with the formation of microphase separation due to the hydrogen bonds of benzoic acids connected themselves from the same backbone. The isotropization temperatures of the H-bonded copolymers and blends increase as the molar ratios of benzoic acids increase, while the higher crosslinking density of the H-bonded copolymeric networks and blends can stabilize the liquid crystalline phase.