Ionomers

Abstract

Since the early 1950s, the introduction of ionic groups has been recognized as a tool that can change the polymer properties. Thus, ionomers, polymers that contain a small amount of ionic groups along the polymer backbone chains, have received considerable attention from industrial as well as academic arenas. It has been found that ionomers exhibit unique properties and morphology, such as two T g s, high melt viscosity, transport behavior, and SAXS “ionomer” peak. In this article, we set out with a introduction on ionomers, and then move on to multiplet/cluster concepts. Subsequently, the glass transition temperatures of ionomers have been discussed. The next section is devoted to a discussion of physical properties of various ionomers, that is, polyethylene‐based ionomers, polytetrafluoroethylene‐based ionomers, polystyrene‐based ionomers, block ionomers, telechelic ionomers, and star ionomers. In the following section, three different types of plasticization using polar, non‐polar, and amphiphilic plasticizers are discussed. Then, various ionic interactions as a tool for miscibility improvement are described. The last section deals with the applications of ionomers briefly.

Structure and Diffusion of Ionic PDMS Melts

“…It is used in biomedicine [ 3 , 4 ], microfluidics [ 5 , 6 , 7 ], MEMS [ 8 ], triboelectricity [ 9 ] and piezoelectrics [ 10 ]. Motivation to explore the structure and dynamics of ionic PDMS [ 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 ] or other melts [ 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 ], is very high since ionic interactions inherit polymers with a functionality that leads to a high performance and applications as gas-separating membranes [ 15 ], water purification membranes [ 13 , 14 , 16 ], energy storage devices [ 39 , 40 ] as well as in sensing [ 22 , 23 ], actuation [ 21 ], fuel cells [ 41 ], and others [ 18 , 19 , 24 , 42 ].…”