A large number of functional polymer materials have been widely used in industrial applications for electronics, optics, and aerospace materials. In these fields, water vapor barrier property to prevent performance degradation of main body was required because these materials are often in the atmosphere. Therefore, investigation of the interaction between polymer materials and water vapor is important to develop further functional materials. The water vapor molecule has the ability to interact strongly with itself and with the polymer via hydrogen bonding. Thus, the polymer materials are swollen and plasticized by water molecules. So far, a large number of water vapor transport properties in a series of family polymers have been investigated in terms of chemical structure and physical property. However, studies on the water vapor sorption property of ABA-type triblock copolymer have not been conducted. In this study, 3 series of ABA-type triblock copolymers derived from polyimide (PI) macroinitiator and polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) were synthesized by atom-transfer radical polymerization. The water vapor sorption property of these polymer membranes was systematically investigated with focusing on the different block length of PMMA. The hydrophobic property tends to increase with increasing the PMMA content in the triblock copolymers, while the PMMA blocks enhanced the charge transfer (CT) interaction between the polyimide segments. The water vapor sorption measurement of triblock copolymers was determined at 35�C. The solubility of triblock copolymers tends to decrease with increasing PMMA content. According to the Zimm-Lundberg analysis, the PMMA block segments in the triblock copolymers accelerated the water vapor clustering due to the high mobility of PMMA. The mobility of PMMA block segments strongly affected not only physical property but also water vapor solubility of triblock copolymers. The ABA triblock copolymerization composed of PI and PMMA is one of the effective ways to improve the hydrophobic property.

Water vapor sorption property of ABA-type triblock copolymer derived from polyimide macroinitiator and polymethylmethacrylate

248th National Meeting (2014)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.