Stress optical behavior in polystyrene; residual stresses and birefringences in large, quenched samples

Abstract

Abstract In a basic study of the nonequilibrium glassy state of polystyrene, two related areas have been investigated. The first dealt with homogeneous samples and included work on volume aging and the effect of temperature on the stress (and strain) optical coefficients and on the modulus. The second dealt with nonhomogeneous samples and included measurement of the frozen‐in birefringence in large, quenched samples and analysis of this residual birefringence, and also the stress, with residual stress theory. The theory used was that of Aggarwala and Saibel, which is a special case of the more general theory of Lee, Rogers, and Woo.