Synthesis of polymer nano-brushes by self-seeding method and study of various morphologies by AFM

Polymer brushes due to their high sensitivity to environmental changes are the best and newest means for developing the responsive materials. Polymer nano-brushes consisting various surface morphologies and uniformly distributed amorphous grafted chains were synthesized via single-crystal growth procedure. Poly(ethylene glycol)-bpolystyrene (PEG-b-PS) and poly(ethylene glycol)-bpoly(methyl methacrylate) (PEG-b-PMMA) block copolymers were prepared by atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP). On the basis of various height differences, phase regions were detectable through atomic force microscopy (AFM NanoscopeIII). The novelty of this work is developing and characterizing the random and intermediate single-co-crystals. Besides, some other sorts of brushcovered single crystals like homo-brush and matrix-dispersed mixed-brushes were involved just for comparing the distinct morphologies. The intermediate (neither matrixdispersed nor random) single-co-crystals were detectable through their thickness fluctuations in AFM height profiles. On the contrary, the random single-cocrystals were verified through comparing with their corresponding homopolymer and homo-brush single crystals. The growth fronts of (120), (240), (200) and (040) were detected by electron diffraction of transmission electron microscope.