Journal of the American Chemical Society, Vol.133, No.46, 18853-18864, 2011
Flow-Directed Block Copolymer Micelle Morphologies via Microfluidic Self-Assembly
The self-assembly of amphiphilic block copolymers in a gas-liquid microfluidic reactor produces variable, flow-directed micellar morphologies entirely different from off-chip equilibrium structures. A polystyrene-block-poly(acrylic acid) copolymer, which forms exclusively spheres off-chip, generates kinetic cylinders, Y-junctions, bilayers, and networks by a mechanism of collision-coalescence enabled by strong and localized on-chip shear fields. Variation in the size and relative amount of flow-directed nanostructures is achieved by changing the water content and flow rate. These results demonstrate on-chip processing routes to specific functional colloidal nanostructures.