PPTC materials are temperature sensitive composites that undergo changes in morphology with temperature increase. Devices fabricated with PPTC materials exhibit extraordinarily large changes in resistance when heated above a certain threshold temperature, commonly over six orders of magnitude. This feature makes the use of PPTC materials in thermal sensing devices highly desirable because of their high sensitivity, flexibility, and low cost. Polymers that are used in commercially available PTC devices are typically semi-crystalline polymers that undergo main chain crystallization and have melting points which are highly dependent on the length of the polymer chain, which is not easily tunable. We are able to synthesize side-chain crystalline polymers, of which the melting points only depend on the length of the side chains, via simple radical polymerization.<br/><br/>In this presentation, we will be discussing our work on the synthesis of a long-chain alkyl acrylate and its side-chain crystalline polymer and copolymers with a series of melting points for sensitive temperature sensors with a wide sensing range. The temperature sensors fabricated from the copolymers exhibit a sensitivity of up to an order of magnitude per centigrade.

Synthesis of long-chain acrylate copolymers for ultra-sensitive temperature sensors with wide range tunability

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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