MORPHOLOGY RESULTING FROM COUPLING OF PHASE-SEPARATION AND GLASS-TRANSITION IN POLYMER BLENDS

At temperatures near glass transition temperature, elf-critical binary polystyrene/polybutadiene (PS/PB) mixtures were found to experience p hase separation through the mechanism of slow hydrodynamic coarsening. A bicontinuous phase structure was produced on quenching tile PS/PB-b lends under cloud point curve Different coarsening regimes of this per colation structure depending on degrees of supersaturation were found. At late stages of coarsening, secondary phase separation was observed .