Orientation in stretched polymer-dispersed liquid crystals

The orientation behavior of liquid crystal molecules in stretched films of polymer-dispersed liquid crystals (PDLC) was investigated by means of infrared dichroism. The liquid crystal used is 4prime-octyl-4-biphenyl-carbonitrile (8CN); the polymer matrices are semicrystalline poly(epsilon-caprolactone) (PCL) and an amorphous miscible blend of PCL with poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC). 8CN was found to have a limit of solubility below 5 wt.% in PCL. We show that an uniaxial stretching can effectively induce a macroscopic orientation of 8CN, and that this orientation can be preserved in the films after removal of the extensional force at room temperature, where 8CN is in its liquid crystalline phase. The molecular orientation is obtained even by stretching PDLC films with 8CN in the liquid state. These results suggest that an elongated polymer cavity in stretched PDLC imposes LC director fields with respect to the long axes of the droplets, which are aligned parallel to the strain direction. The experiments also reveal that the orientation of 8CN is higher in stretched PDLC with a semicrystalline matrix (PCL) than with an amorphous matrix (the PCL-PVC blend), and that the sizes of the LC droplets also have a slight effect on the induced orientation. This work represents a first step in the exploration of new electrooptical effects of PDLC through the presence of a uniform orientation of the liquid crystal molecules and modifications of the polymer cavity at the electrical field-off state.Key words: polymer-dispersed liquid crystals, molecular orientation, infrared dichroism, electrooptical materials.

Melt Processed Electrically Conductive Binary and Ternary Immiscible Polymer / Polyaniline Blends

In the present study, conductive binary and ternary blends of PANI with thermoplastic polymers were prepared by melt processing.The binary blends' investigation focused on the morphology and on the resulting electrical conductivity. Generally, the level of interaction between the doped PANI and the matrix polymer determines the blend morphology, and thus, its electrical conductivity. The morphology of a conductive network is described by a primary structure of small dispersed polyaniline particles, interconnected by secondary short range fine fibrillar structure. In blends containing a semicrystalline matrix the doped PANI network locates within the amorphous regions, leading to a reduction of the percolation concentration.The ternary blends' investigation focused on a system containing two co-continuous immiscible thermoplastic polymers and PANI. The PANI is preferably located in one of the matrix polymers. This concentration effect enables high electrical conductivities at low PANI contents.