APPLICATION OF SEGMENTAL INTERACTION ENERGIES TO MISCIBILITY PREDICTION IN BINARY AND TERNARY COPOLYMER SOLID-SOLUTIONS

Many binary polymer mixtures, where at least one of the components is a copolymer, are capable of forming miscible blends within certain restricted ranges of compositions of the copolymers. The segmental interaction parameters chi-ij can be determined from many of these systems when the phase boundaries are established, and can be used to predict miscibility in other blends. Determination of chi-ij parameters is illustrated for a number of different copolymer mixtures and the ability to predict and map the miscibility regions in other blends is demonstrated. The technique has been extended to ternary copolymer systems with satisfactory results.