Dynamics of PDMS-<i>g</i>-PDMS Bottlebrush Polymers by Broadband Dielectric Spectroscopy
Bruno Jakobi, Karin J. Bichler, Anna Sokolova, Gerald J. Schneider
Abstract
Poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS)-based bottlebrush polymers, PDMS-g-PDMS, have been synthesized by anionic polymerization in combination with a condensation-based grafting reaction. Bottlebrush polymers show intriguing features, e.g., extremely low viscosities. Hereby, studies of their dynamics are rare. Therefore, we focus on the segmental relaxation by broadband dielectric spectroscopy. An increasing cross-sectional radius proportional to the increasing side chain length has been observed by small-angle neutron scattering over three samples. A comparison of the segmental relaxation times of the bottlebrushes with the respective linear chains reveals slower dynamics in the former. For longer chains, this effect vanishes.