SPINODAL DECOMPOSITION OF A POLYSTYRENE POLY(CYCLOHEXYL ACRYLATE-STAT-BUTYL METHACRYLATE) BLEND/

The dynamics of spinodal decomposition (SD) after a temperature jump f rom a kinetically formed single phase state into the unstable part of the two-phase region has been studied with a blend of polystyrene and poly(cyclohexyl acrylate-statbutyl methacrylate). The time evolution o f the structure factor has been examined by small-angle neutron and li ght-scattering techniques. The combination of the different techniques gave access to a wide wave vector and time range covering a large ran ge of length scales. The activation energy of the diffusion process du ring spinodal decomposition was determined by a scaling analysis of th e later stages of SD, because early stages of SD could not be resolved .