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Authors Lang, M. ; Fischer, J. ; Werner, M. ; Sommer, J.-U.
Title Olympic gels: Concatenation and swelling
Date 18.12.2015
Number 45502
Abstract Concatenation and equilibrium swelling of Olympic gels, which are composed of entangled cyclic polymers, is studied under athermal conditions with Monte-Carlo simulations. The average number of concatenated molecules per cyclic polymer, fn, is found to depend on the degree of polymerization, N, and polymer volume fraction at network preparation, inline image, as inline image with scaling exponent v?=?0.588. In contrast to chemically cross-linked polymer networks, we observe that Olympic gels made of longer cyclic chains exhibit a smaller equilibrium swelling degree, inline image, at the same polymer volume fraction inline image. This observation is explained by a des-interspersion process of overlapping non-concatenated rings upon swelling, which is tested directly by analyzing the change in overlap of the molecules upon swelling.
Publisher Macromolecular Symposia
Wikidata
Citation Macromolecular Symposia 358 (2015) 140-147
DOI https://doi.org/10.1002/masy.201500013
Tags computer modeling elastomer macrocycles olympic gels swelling

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