Morphological Transformations of Nonequilibrium Assemblies of Amphiphilic Diblock Copolymer
writer:Cong, Y; Zhou, Q; Chen, B; Fang, JH; Fu, J.
keywords:block copolymer, micelles
source:期刊
specific source:COLLOID JOURNAL, 2014, 76(6), 774-781
Issue time:2014年
Amphiphilic diblock copolymer polystyrene-block-poly(ethylene oxide) (PS-PEO) assembled into nonequilibrium bicontinuous structures or mixture of vesicles, bilayers and nanorods upon rapid micellization induced by rapid addition of selective solvent (water) into the PS-PEO solutions in a common solvent (dimethyl formamide) with different concentrations. These kinetically trapped assemblies were unstable and slowly evolved into thermodynamically favorable spheres and vesicles. The addition of non-ionic surfactant Pluronic P123 upon rapid micellization generated novel nanocages and flower-like vesicles. The nanocages spontaneously transformed into tubules capped with vesicles. These novel assemblies are beyond the classic phase diagram of block copolymer self-assemblies, especially for those primarily based on thermodynamics.