Structure and rheology of hyperbranched and dendritic polymers. II. Effects of blending acetylated and hydroxy-terminated poly(propyleneimine) dendrimers with aqueous poly(ethylene oxide) solutions

Abstract

The effect of adding acetylated poly(propyleneimine) dendrimers to the structure and rheology of aqueous solutions of high molecular weight poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) was investigated by rheology and small-angle neutron scattering in a temperature range of 10–40 °C. In the semidilute regime, the steady shear rheology of PEO solutions was unmodified by the addition of dendrimers at a comparable weight concentration. At the highest concentrations studied, the addition of acetylated dendrimers suppressed the onset of a low-frequency elastic modulus at the lowest temperature investigated. For comparison, the addition of PEO of a comparable molecular weight at the same weight fraction resulted in a milder suppression but, unlike the dendrimers, greatly increased the solution viscosity. The addition of acetylated dendrimers to a semidilute PEO solution at 10 °C substantially reduced the solution turbidity. These effects on the rheology and optical properties were confirmed by small-angle neutron scattering measurements of the molecular structure of the mixture. Additional SANS measurements in the dilute regime (0.1 wt % PEO) showed quantitatively that the dendrimers decorated the PEO chains in a necklace structure, such as that observed previously for micelles. The results suggested a mechanism of rheology modification whereby the dendrimers disrupted the association network structure in the PEO solution at lower temperatures by preferentially associating with the PEO chains in solution. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Polym Sci B: Polym Phys 38: 874–882, 2000