COMPETING INTERACTIONS AND LEVELS OF ORDERING IN SELF-ORGANIZING POLYMERIC MATERIALS

The sophisticated use of self-organizing materials, which include liqu id crystals, block copolymers, hydrogen-and pi-bonded complexes, and m any natural polymers, may hold the key to developing new structures an d devices in many advanced technology industries. Synthetic materials are usually designed with only one structure-forming process in mind. However, combination of both complementary and antagonistic interactio ns in macromolecular systems can create order in materials over many l ength scales. Here polymer materials that make use of competing molecu lar interactions are summarized, and the prospects for the further dev elopment of such materials through both synthetic and processing pathw ays are highlighted.