Synthesis of urea-containing ABA triblock copolymers: Influence of pendant hydrogen bonding on morphology and thermomechanical properties

Reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization produced novel ABA triblock copolymers with associative urea sites within pendant groups in the external hard blocks. The ABA triblock copolymers served as models to study the influence of pendant hydrogen bonding on polymer physical properties and morphology. The triblock copolymers consisted of a soft central block of poly(di(ethylene glycol) methyl ether methacrylate) (polyDEGMEMA, 58 kg/mol) and hard copolymer external blocks of poly(2-(3-hexylureido)ethyl methacrylate-co-2-(3-phenylureido)ethyl methacrylate) (polyUrMA, 18-116 kg/mol). Copolymerization of 2-(3-hexylureido)ethyl methacrylate (HUrMA) and 2-(3-phenylureido)ethyl methacrylate (PhUrMA) imparted tunable hard block T-g's from 69 to 134 degrees C. Tunable hard block T-g's afforded versatile thermomechanical properties for diverse applications. Dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) of the triblock copolymers exhibited high modulus plateau regions (similar to 100 MPa) over a wide temperature range (-10 to 90 degrees C), which was indicative of microphase separation. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) confirmed surface microphase separation with various morphologies. Variable temperature FTIR (VT-FTIR) revealed the presence of both monodentate and bidentate hydrogen bonding, and pendant hydrogen bonding remained as an ordered structure to higher than expected temperatures. This study presents a fundamental understanding of the influence of hydrogen bonding on polymer physical properties and reveals the response of pendant urea hydrogen bonding as a function of temperature as compared to main chain polyureas. (C) 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.